so it was bound to happen...

[jonathon0883]

Alright so i thought putting a sump together would be a piece of cake...i consider myself a rather smart fellow so i thought i could handle it. Well..i was wrong.. first off...my stand barely fits a 10 gal tank underneath of it...and i mean barely... well it would just so happen that after i get the tank in the stand it would crack...after i added water...so i take it out..and i figure heck just use a rubbermaid container...so i get my skimmer in there..my heaters and my mag 7...well then i started looking at my hob overflow box and it just didnt seem like it would be easy to get started...and it wasnt..i sucked down about 2 gals of water and i couldnt get the siphon to stay so the pump would start filling the main tank allllllll the way up...so then i got scared and unplugged the pump...and pulled the u tube out of the overflow...but it had enough water in it to fill my sump up and over the top...yep thats my story of the day...it sucked...the gf was pissed because of the water and i couldnt get the taste of salt out of my mouth...oh well life goes on...so if anyone has any tips...i would appreciate them..or i might just sell the pump and overflow

 

[daniel411]

First, I'd definately get a check valve on my pump return line and/or a siphon break at the top.
Also you don't want your sump to be but about half full. Low enough normal water level that if the pump fails; due to power out, UNPLUGING, etc. the water that water that will still go down the over flow won't do anything but fill the sump close to full... and not spill out.
I never lost my siphon even when the power went out. You can always hook up the small tube you used to create the siphon on the suction side of a power head nearby. So it will always try and pull some air out.

 

[beaslbob]

sounds like the problems I am having setting up my sump refugium. I bought a HOB syphon which worked fine. But i forgot that the powerhead also formed a syphon when power was out. So had to place the output high enough to break syphon after the display drained a little bit. The syphon to the sump has a box inside the tank (may not be necessary) and on the outside. The U tube syphon connects the two and the overflow tube goes through the bottom of the outside and about half way up. The inside box is adjustible. When the display water level gets to the top of the box, water stops flowing into the box. But the u tube still is full of water. therefore on power return, the syphon is still active.
Hope that all makes sense LOL. Now I am attempting to build a filter media box and replace the clear flexible tube from the power head with pvc. Gee this is fun.

 

[tony detroit]

The siphon from the power out can also be eliminated by shortening the pipe coming from your return. It can only siphon out the water that it touches. Set it up so that it only goes in the water slightly and you won't have to worry about overflowing again.