return from sump blowing bubbles..
- Thread starter peckhead
- Start date
peckhead
Active Member
im going to try and get a picture. the hose is in the tank. so the water is being spit out under water but there is a little hole in the j tube. not the hose but the part that hangs into the tank and it is spiting water out of the little hole and that hole is not in the water but i dont think that will make microbubbles
solarscar
Member
thought i would add that i actually never drilled a hole in my return line, its about a half inch lower then my overflow box and i actually want the water to flow back through so that when i feed the tank water is well below the overflow box. I hated seeing half the food being blown into the overflow box. Of course test everything first. And yes, test for a siphon break in your j-tube. I actually had a crack in mine some how which caused the siphon to break and the main tank overflowed. I was pissed. Can't just test for power failures, though i would consider it rare what happened to me.
ophiura
Active Member
It is important to have a picture. Do you have any baffles in the sump or does the water just come in, and then go out. Does it go through any sponges or anything? If your water is flowing quickly through the sump, then the air can be getting in simply from the water coming out from the tank, through the plumbing, to the sump and basically circulating so fast the bubbles don't have time to rise to the surface and be removed.
ophiura
Active Member
So, to review:
You have turned your protein skimmer off, and you still have bubbles
You have tightened your various return line hoses, and still bubbles
You definitely see the bubbles being blown in through the return line.
Is there a piece of sponge between the bioball chamber and the rest of the sump (where the return pump is?)
You have turned your protein skimmer off, and you still have bubbles
You have tightened your various return line hoses, and still bubbles
You definitely see the bubbles being blown in through the return line.
Is there a piece of sponge between the bioball chamber and the rest of the sump (where the return pump is?)
ophiura
Active Member
When people talk of microbubbles and ready to quite, for contrast, I always think of a tank I cared for...it brought me to tears several times. (you can see the snail trails through the bubbles....and this was shortly after the window was "brushed" to remove the bubbles, done several times a day) Many things were killed (well, for this, and the copper) and it was always "cloudy" looking.
The ultimate problem on this tank was a fundamental design flaw. It was a combination of two large overflows that ultimately drained into one pipe causing a major cavitation, and zillions of microbubbles. When this water got to the sump, the water was moving so quickly that the tiny bubbles didn't have a chance to work out...and the cycle repeated. Lots of baffles were added to try and stop this, but I believe to this day it is still a problem.
But it can put things into perspective. Eventually I am sure that the source of your bubble problem can be identified. But it will take some time to try and come up with ideas, and talk you through trying things out.
Do you get any sort of "flushing" noise from your overflow and drain?
The ultimate problem on this tank was a fundamental design flaw. It was a combination of two large overflows that ultimately drained into one pipe causing a major cavitation, and zillions of microbubbles. When this water got to the sump, the water was moving so quickly that the tiny bubbles didn't have a chance to work out...and the cycle repeated. Lots of baffles were added to try and stop this, but I believe to this day it is still a problem.
But it can put things into perspective. Eventually I am sure that the source of your bubble problem can be identified. But it will take some time to try and come up with ideas, and talk you through trying things out.
Do you get any sort of "flushing" noise from your overflow and drain?
sly
Active Member
Originally Posted by ophiura
The ultimate problem on this tank was a fundamental design flaw. It was a combination of two large overflows that ultimately drained into one pipe causing a major cavitation, and zillions of microbubbles. When this water got to the sump, the water was moving so quickly that the tiny bubbles didn't have a chance to work out...and the cycle repeated. Lots of baffles were added to try and stop this, but I believe to this day it is still a problem.
You might be able to fix the problem by installing a wet/dry filter. As the water trickles down the bioballs it will seperate out most if not all of the bubbles. Then channel that water through a foam block to polish it before it hits the rest of the sump.
The ultimate problem on this tank was a fundamental design flaw. It was a combination of two large overflows that ultimately drained into one pipe causing a major cavitation, and zillions of microbubbles. When this water got to the sump, the water was moving so quickly that the tiny bubbles didn't have a chance to work out...and the cycle repeated. Lots of baffles were added to try and stop this, but I believe to this day it is still a problem.
You might be able to fix the problem by installing a wet/dry filter. As the water trickles down the bioballs it will seperate out most if not all of the bubbles. Then channel that water through a foam block to polish it before it hits the rest of the sump.
ophiura
Active Member
LOL, that would be a great idea if that is what is going on for the tank in question (that is why a picture would really help
). The tank in the picture is over 3500g with a several hundred gallon (and several 10s of thousands of dollars) sump, with plumbing under the cement floor. So it would be a bit hard to manage that.
Fundamentally there is one issue that may be working in both cases, and that is that the water may be flowing too quickly through the sump, not allowing the suspended bubbled to get out.
Fundamentally there is one issue that may be working in both cases, and that is that the water may be flowing too quickly through the sump, not allowing the suspended bubbled to get out.
peckhead
Active Member
that is the exact model. pro clear aquatics 75 with the same company skimmer. and i use their over flow box too. its on a 44 g tank. im not sure about the return pumps make but i will get back to you on that tongiht or in the morning. not sure if it has always blown bubbles but i would say yes as far as i can think of. and like i said ever minute or so it will shoot out alot of bubbles for like 1 second then just blow a smaller stead amount of bubbles.