Draining my separate refugium into my sump

[Reeftopia24]

So I have 2 tanks next to each other under my stand. I can not drill ether of them how should I go about draining my refugium into my sump? I was thinking about modifying a hob overflow to drain between them.

Any suggestions?

the tank on the right will be full while the sump is about 10-12" deep water.


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[Reeftopia24]

Draining my seperate refugium into my sump

Sorry for the crudely drawn picture.

Here is what I have come up with so far.

The overflow box will be silicones into the smaller tank, then I will have to make a custom U tube to go between the tanks.




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[Reeftopia24]

Draining my seperate refugium into my sump

Will it be possible to make a U tube from 1" PVC to go across the 2 tank trim pieces? I think I will need to add a aqua lift pump to keep the siphon going.

Any suggestions are welcome and much needed.


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[Reeftopia24]

Draining my seperate refugium into my sump

Or should I try this style?

Flow rate should be about 500-600 gph.


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[kimle]

Draining my seperate refugium into my sump

What would happen in a power outage? Looks like the left (higher) tank would still keep draining into the sump until the bottom of the siphon tube. I guess just make sure your sump has that extra water capacity and that you can restart the siphon.

 

[Reeftopia24]

Draining my seperate refugium into my sump

What would happen in a power outage? Looks like the left (higher) tank would still keep draining into the sump until the bottom of the siphon tube. I guess just make sure your sump has that extra water capacity and that you can restart the siphon.

The tank on the left is only half full. I have lots of room for overflow water if the power goes out. I can raise up the right tank a few inches if that will help out. I will be getting a aqua lifter to re prime the siphon when power goes out.

I would like to use the first idea I think I would have the best results with that style drain.

I'll work on getting some better pics today of my ideas.


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[ReeferBob]

Siphons rely on gravity to work. With your tanks at the same height, you will be able to maintain the same level, but I don't think it is going to work with a standard overflow like you have drawn as I think the water level in the 2 tanks is not going to be at the optimal level. You could just put a u-tube between the tanks, but any problems with that and you have a flood. I assume you are going to drain from the DT to the sump, then to the fuge via some sort of u-tube siphon, then back into the tank via pump from the fuge? If one of your tanks was 6" higher then the other, it would be a lot easier. For this to work like you want it, I think you need to drill a whole at the desired water level of both tanks and run a flexible pipe between them. With that, you are not worried about losing siphon and having a flood. Personally, I would lose the 2nd tank. If you really want more volume, try to find a bigger single tank.

 

[Reeftopia24]

Draining my seperate refugium into my sump

Siphons rely on gravity to work. With your tanks at the same height, you will be able to maintain the same level, but I don't think it is going to work with a standard overflow like you have drawn as I think the water level in the 2 tanks is not going to be at the optimal level. You could just put a u-tube between the tanks, but any problems with that and you have a flood. I assume you are going to drain from the DT to the sump, then to the fuge via some sort of u-tube siphon, then back into the tank via pump from the fuge? If one of your tanks was 6" higher then the other, it would be a lot easier. For this to work like you want it, I think you need to drill a whole at the desired water level of both tanks and run a flexible pipe between them. With that, you are not worried about losing siphon and having a flood. Personally, I would lose the 2nd tank. If you really want more volume, try to find a bigger single tank.

All water is draining into the sump( left tank 75 gallon, half full) from main tank. Then back up from pump in the sump. The refugium( on right smaller tank) will be feed from the sump with another pump then drain back into the sump return pump section with an overflow. And I am unable to drill the smaller tank its tempered.

don't know if this pic makes it easier to understand how it will flow from the 2 tanks.


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[ReeferBob]

Ah ok - I would suggest using 1 pump and tee off that with low flow to the fuge. This way you avoid a flood if one pump fails. I think what you suggest will work, I would still worry about the siphon breaking though.

 

[Reeftopia24]

Draining my seperate refugium into my sump

Ah ok - I would suggest using 1 pump and tee off that with low flow to the fuge. This way you avoid a flood if one pump fails. I think what you suggest will work, I would still worry about the siphon breaking though.

I was worried about the siphon stopping also that's why I was going to add an aqualift pump to it so it should restart it self. But thank you for the input reeferbob! I'll update you guys on the progress soon. I should have it running next week.


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[fragmatic]

That is a scary method IMO. I have a separate refugium too. What I did was watch the garage sales and found an acrylic tank that fits for the refugium. Mine is a 15 gallon "I think" (fit was more importance than size). It was easy to drill it at the level I wanted it to stay with a common wood hole saw, used a bulkhead fitting for a 1" PVC because you don't need much flow in a refugium. Then you put spacers under it to raise it above the sump level. I put a long strainer the at the bulkhead and it gravity drains all water above the bulkhead into the sump. Then I used a branch of the pump system that runs my reactors to provide flow into the refugium.

 

[kimle]

I just did a similar test in my garage. I had a main tank, sump and refugium. The sump and refugium are at the same level. Overflow water is spit into the refugium and there is a U-Tube draining the refugium into the sump. The trick is that I placed a 10 inch tall vase into the refugium which acts like an overflow box. One end of the tube is in the bottom of the vase and the other end of the U-tube is near the bottom of the sump. This ensures the U-tube never breaks siphon.

The vase prevents the refugium from flooding your sump when there is a power outage. With the U-Tube, it'll try to make the water level on both sides equal. So in a power outage, the water level in the vase will drop to the water level in your sump. The refugium's water level will be at the top of the vase (10 inches)

As safety measure, instead of splitting the main tank overflow, you can just add a little pump to transfer water from the sump into the refugium. Just put an float switch on that pump which will detect if the refugium is about to flood...meaning that your U-Tube siphon is broken.

 

[Reeftopia24]

Draining my seperate refugium into my sump

I just did a similar test in my garage. I had a main tank, sump and refugium. The sump and refugium are at the same level. Overflow water is spit into the refugium and there is a U-Tube draining the refugium into the sump. The trick is that I placed a 10 inch tall vase into the refugium which acts like an overflow box. One end of the tube is in the bottom of the vase and the other end of the U-tube is near the bottom of the sump. This ensures the U-tube never breaks siphon.

The vase prevents the refugium from flooding your sump when there is a power outage. With the U-Tube, it'll try to make the water level on both sides equal. So in a power outage, the water level in the vase will drop to the water level in your sump. The refugium's water level will be at the top of the vase (10 inches)

As safety measure, instead of splitting the main tank overflow, you can just add a little pump to transfer water from the sump into the refugium. Just put an float switch on that pump which will detect if the refugium is about to flood...meaning that your U-Tube siphon is broken.

Thanks for this!!
I will be using a modified hang on back over flow, so the U tube will be under water on both sides and it should not be much different then your design. And I will be using a separate pump to feed the refugium like you said. All the water from the main tank is draining into my sump( none will drain into the refugium) see the drawing a few posts up. My water level won't be equal in both tanks sump is only 11-12" of water in it. Ill add pics of setup this afternoon.


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[scottishreefer]

I have a separate sump and refugium. Water from the main tank drains into the sump and I use a pump from there to deliver water into the refugium. I am fortunate that my refugium sits slightly higher than the sump so I drilled a hole into the side of the refugium, fitted a bulkhead and some pipe so that water from the refugium drains into the final chamber of the sump before being pumped back into the main tank. In a sense like where you intend to use your overflow from refugium to the sump. Like others have said, losing the syphon in the overflow would be your biggest problem. Do you have room to drill a hole in each tank, fit a bulkhead on each and connect them with a piece of pipe instead of using the overflow? That way, you dont need to worry of losing any syphon as the water pumped into the refugium is directly draining from there back to the sump. You only need to match the flow from the pump feeding the refugium to the flow in the pipe draining back into your sump. I hope this makes sense.

 

[tbryan]

Having that fuge higher than the sump would be ideal so you could drill for a gravity drain, but i see you already have limited stand height, any chance you could cut the stand floor out from under the sump and have it sit lower?

 

[tbryan]

Or since the water level is much lower in the sump, you could just drill a through hole in the sump and put a bulkhead in the fuge, if you have room in between for the bulkhead.