Plumbing manifold design

Ecotech Marine
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Wow, that big of a tank and they still go into a 1" reducer at the bulkhead? They did that on my current 75gal. If I had it to do all over I would check the back wall of the tank for tempered and if not I would drill and go external. Pulled the cornerflo out and patched on the inside with a glass patch over the bottom holes.
 
Tidal Gardens
crusso1993 said:
You are right about the remaining water in the OF compartment. I thought you had accounted for that in the "15-20" gallons you mentioned. My bad on that... ;Yawn
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It's a big tank, so halfway down the overflow could be significant even with a ~90 gallon sump. I calculated based on the durso overflow.
What if I used both holes for full drains and had them at the same height? Instead of the herbie?
 
scriptmonkey said:
Wow, that big of a tank and they still go into a 1" reducer at the bulkhead? They did that on my current 75gal. If I had it to do all over I would check the back wall of the tank for tempered and if not I would drill and go external. Pulled the cornerflo out and patched on the inside with a glass patch over the bottom holes.
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Ya I didn't realize it until I had it home. It said 1.5" drain, didn't say anything about a reducer
 
BRS
scriptmonkey said:
Wow, that big of a tank and they still go into a 1" reducer at the bulkhead? They did that on my current 75gal. If I had it to do all over I would check the back wall of the tank for tempered and if not I would drill and go external. Pulled the cornerflo out and patched on the inside with a glass patch over the bottom holes.
Click to expand...

Definitely not comfortable drilling into a $2000 tank so that won't be an option
 
Chewy.com
@CoreyWakefield123 so can I ask, what are your goals flow wise in your sump? Are you looking for 10 times, or more?? Or are you happy with 5 times?
 
JoshH said:
@CoreyWakefield123 so can I ask, what are your goals flow wise in your sump? Are you looking for 10 times, or more?? Or are you happy with 5 times?
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I've always been told 5-10x so I'd like to shoot for that. It will be a mixed reef heavy on sps so as much as possible
 
So, to show my ignorance, I was trying to chase all the flow required in the tank via return pump and then someone wise on the forum told me no idiot, that is what wave pumps were for. So to answer you, I was tring to hit 10x after that and in reality I am 5.
 
BRS
CoreyWakefield123 said:
It's a big tank, so halfway down the overflow could be significant even with a ~90 gallon sump. I calculated based on the durso overflow.
What if I used both holes for full drains and had them at the same height? Instead of the herbie?
Click to expand...

I would not do this as it could be potential disaster in an emergency situation. Plus, the amount of noise they would make would be really, really annoying.
 
CoreyWakefield123 said:
I've always been told 5-10x so I'd like to shoot for that. It will be a mixed reef heavy on sps so as much as possible
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A more common flow rate now is around 3-5 times your display volume through your sump. Any additional flow inside your Display that's needed should be accomplished with powerheads. Might I make a suggestion here and focus on sticking around 5 times, then use only 1 pump for your return (you can plumb 1 pump to two outlets if you wish). The second pump you can use only for your manifold and directly control the flow to your equipment. Just a thought....

In full disclosure I am a little biased to this option as I always feel a manifold should have it's own pump :)
 
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CoreyWakefield123 said:
I've always been told 5-10x so I'd like to shoot for that. It will be a mixed reef heavy on sps so as much as possible
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There are all kinds of different ideas about tank turnover in a sump. In recent years, it has been discovered, to the consternation of some, that high turnover isn't as important as it once was thought to be. One nice thing about high turnover is the amount of flow back to the tank thereby reducing the number of wave makers inside the display. Also, depending on the wave makers used, can lead to a little bit of cost savings.
 
JoshH said:
A more common flow rate now is around 3-5 times your display volume through your sump. Any additional flow inside your Display that's needed should be accomplished with powerheads. Might I make a suggestion here and focus on sticking around 5 times, then use only 1 pump for your return (you can plumb 1 pump to two outlets if you wish). The second pump you can use only for your manifold and directly control the flow to your equipment. Just a thought....
Click to expand...

Knowing that the 1" drains are the only option now, this is definitely a good idea!
 
Ok then so I'll just stick to how the tank is manufactured with the durso overflows. I'm not too concerned with noise as it's not in the main living area and frankly it doesn't really bother me.
However I do want to have each overflow on an independent pump so if for some reason one fails the tank can still function until I can fix it.
Can we all agree for the manifold I should have 2 outlets into each return pump and not 4 into one? I won't even need the manifold initially as I plan on running the calcium reactor off of its own kamoer peristaltic pump but down the line I'm sure I may want to add some reactors or who knows and I would want to balance it out between the 2 pumps right? So in essence have 2 manifolds? Thanks for all the help guys!
 
CoreyWakefield123 said:
Ok then so I'll just stick to how the tank is manufactured with the durso overflows. I'm not too concerned with noise as it's not in the main living area and frankly it doesn't really bother me.
However I do want to have each overflow on an independent pump so if for some reason one fails the tank can still function until I can fix it.
Can we all agree for the manifold I should have 2 outlets into each return pump and not 4 into one? I won't even need the manifold initially as I plan on running the calcium reactor off of its own kamoer peristaltic pump but down the line I'm sure I may want to add some reactors or who knows and I would want to balance it out between the 2 pumps right? So in essence have 2 manifolds? Thanks for all the help guys!
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I'll still stand by my suggestion and in that case you could just swap off your manifold pump for your main return and be back running in minutes... but to each there own....

I'll add that you could plumb the manifold pump in such a way that if the main return died you could just turn a couple valves and be rocking the return again in seconds.

Also, if your return pump fails, the only crucial thing for your tank is that it has flow and heat. It can do without the sump for some time as long as it has flow and heat. Flow will be provided from your powerheads anyway and it's pretty easy to toss a heater in:)

If I HAD to choose between those two options, it would be the 2 on each return. But in saying that, it's not worth the hassle of having to do something, constantly and that's adjusting it. Down the road when you're running reactors and they start to clog up this can effect the return flow of your pump, or in your case, pumps.
 
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Tidal Gardens
CoreyWakefield123 said:
Ok then so I'll just stick to how the tank is manufactured with the durso overflows. I'm not too concerned with noise as it's not in the main living area and frankly it doesn't really bother me.
However I do want to have each overflow on an independent pump so if for some reason one fails the tank can still function until I can fix it.
Can we all agree for the manifold I should have 2 outlets into each return pump and not 4 into one? I won't even need the manifold initially as I plan on running the calcium reactor off of its own kamoer peristaltic pump but down the line I'm sure I may want to add some reactors or who knows and I would want to balance it out between the 2 pumps right? So in essence have 2 manifolds? Thanks for all the help guys!
Click to expand...

Sorry about not getting back last night. Started battling some kind of bug yesterday and fell asleep early. Unfortunately, I woke up shortly after and was up and down for the remainder of the night. This is usually no big deal as I have lived with insomnia since about the age of 10. However, the bug is affecting me adversely. In the spirit of transparency, I could tell this bug started affecting my thought processing yesterday too but didn't want to admit I was coming down with something. You know, that whole "trying to stay positive and not giving in to the idea of being sick" thing! Anyway, it didn't work and I digress.

To answer your last question; running the provided Dursos with with 2 manifolds will work. Also, with those VarioS pumps return will obviously not be an issue. The addition of additional equipment down the road can be dealt with at that time.

Full disclosure; it's not the method I would employ. All that matters, though, is that it works and you're happy. As the saying goes, "If you're happy then I'm happy!"

Looking forward to moving through the next steps!
 
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I'm a plumber by trade (40 years), an aquarist for about 20 years. I support the idea of each pump serving 2 individual returns, preferably one each at opposite ends of the tank. You could run each pump at +/- 75%. My thought being that with the redundancy, if one were to fail, you could turn the good pump up to 100% temporarily and you'd still have good flow/coverage while you worked to replace the bad pump. Just my thoughts.
 
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