question about return pumps for sump

crysmom · #1 10-04-2009, 05:08 PM

My husband and I are plumbing our new soon to be reef aquarium today.

Its a 110 gallon corner drilled 4 foot wide tank with a marinland tidepool2 sump

I have no idea what kind of return pump I should get? how many gph? the sump says 300-600 gph but can I go bigger? the stand is 30inches and the tank itself is 30 inches so there is 5 feet it needs to pump up i'd like a lot of flow

christyf5 · #2 10-04-2009, 05:35 PM

the size of pump you'll need is restricted by your overflow. Both the overflow surface length and size of plumbing inside the overflow (diameter of the drain basically) will restrict the amount of water that can exit the tank into the sump. You don't want to have water pumping into the tank faster than it is exiting.

For example, I currently have a mag 12 (1200gph) running on my 90gallon tank. I have 12" of overflow length and a 1.5" pipe running into the sump. I find that even with 6-7' of return plumbing to the tank its almost too much for the overflow to handle. Previously I used a mag 9 (950gph) and it was fine however I went to the mag 12 because I was running a chiller at the time and the extra length of return plumbing slowed down the pump.

I'd say you can likely run between 600 and 900 gph through your sump. You'll have to add powerheads to the tank in order to increase your flow as just having the return pump will not be near enough flow.

Perhaps if you can provide more information on the diameter of the plumbing in the overflow as well as length of the overflow (or take a photo if thats easier) we can give you some better suggestions

crysmom · #3 10-04-2009, 05:46 PM

the overflow pipe is 2inches and abour 25 inches long but under the tank before it hits the sump it drops to a one inch pipe

the return size plumbing hasn't been bought yet

christyf5 · #4 10-04-2009, 05:51 PM

ok so you're going to be restricted by the amount of water that can be put through that 1" pipe. So I'd say you should aim for about 600gph or so. Now you need to find a pump that puts out about 600gph after the 5 feet of head pressure.

crysmom · #5 10-04-2009, 07:04 PM

off to the harware store

I read on jl aquatics there is a quiet one 4000 with 600gph at 6 foot head I think that one will work

Albertan22 · #6 10-05-2009, 06:41 PM

Be careful with the Quiet One Pumps. I'm currently running a Quiet One 3000 and it doesn't restart after power failiures or interuptions. It did fine for the first month, but now, not so much. In my sump the water level rises quite a bit when the pump is off, which causes my skimmer to overflow like crazy into the sump when it restarts and the return pump doesn't.

I'm currently looking at bitting the bullet and switching to an eheim or something...

banditpowdercoat · #7 10-05-2009, 06:47 PM

See, and my Quiet one 3000 has never failed to restart in over a year. I shut it off alot too. weird!!

sphelps · #8 10-05-2009, 07:01 PM

I talked to the Quiet One manufacturer before about a few problems with the pumps, mostly being noise and restarting issues. They stated they both result from overheating which usually is a result of lack of maintenance. Lime deposits build up fairly quickly on these pumps and cause excessive friction resulting in more heat which warps the impeller magnet. This causes excess noise and sometimes prevents the pump from restarting. They said a new impeller usually fixes the problem and it should be cleaned regularly to prevent failure. High calcium tanks are more susceptible to this problem.

Albertan22 · #9 10-06-2009, 01:06 AM

My system has only been running for a few weeks, so I don't think the restart thing is a maintenance is an issue. May just be luck of the draw, who knows... On the other hand, the pump has been very quiet for me

new but handy · #10 10-06-2009, 01:22 AM

Welcome to the site. There are a few of us Vernon'ers on here