Looking To Upgrade Tanks, Sump Tank Questions

[star4]

After months of discussion with hubby we are looking at upgrading our tanks. This process is going to take years . I am looking at a large tank with a sump and it has dawned on my I have no idea how a sump works lol or what the filtration of a sump works out to.
 
The tank I am looking at is 950l including a 100l sump. Is this enough filtration for this size tank for messy american cichlids? I have no idea what the pump l/hr is, it does not say, but with a sump do you filter the same as an external? I still want a minimum 10x turnover/hour
 
How do sump tanks work exactly?
 
How do you clean out a sump tank (I am only use to external filters)?
 
 

 

[techen]

 
Marine tank sure, But it's a good example. You want a section of the tank for the overflow. The pipe leading down to the sump MUST be adjustable so you can choose how much water drops into the sump tank. Then you have sections, However this is normally a marine thing and you could just have a tank at the bottom with no sections its entirely up to you and what you want to keep in it. Then at the far end, Waterpump. This MUST be adjustable too. You want quite a large pump, Adjustable as well. So you can adjust the water going into the sump and adjust the water going out, After a few days playing with it you'll get a outflow and inflow that are even. Just make sure your overflow section does no block else you'll be draining your sump. Say for the other side, etc.

 

[star4]

Thanks, so how can it work with a fresh water tank? would you just add sponge, bio balls etc into the baffles of a sump tank?
 
With putting a heater in the sump tank would you put in heaters that would heat the whole volume (950l eg 2 x 500w heaters) or only for heating the sump tank itself?

 

[DrRob]

I use freshwater sumps. They're fairly simple beasties.
 
Think of them like a large volume external filter, with room for other bits, water goes in, goes through the media (with large volumes you can use simple media, I like alphagrog because it's quite cheap, but sponge is good as well). Somewhere along the lines you have a space for kit like your heaters and then you have a return pump.
 
Personally, I've never used the adjustments on the return pumps, but the standpipe adjuster is indeed useful, especially if you want silent running (which generally requires at least 2 overflows to get some quite flow).
 
As for 10 times flow, it depends what you're trying to achieve. The more water you send through the sump the more the variation in water level you'll have in it between pump on and pump off (always fill a sump with the power off, as that's what it'll fill to if the pump stops in a power outage of if you turn off the pump for maintenance. Personally I find lots of sump flow annoying and sometimes counterproductive and I can generally hide a powerhead in the tank to keep the water turning over. Plus sump set ups are often not ideally suited to getting flow into the dark corners of big tanks.

 

[star4]

Thanks Dr Rob. With the turnover what I meant was I do not know with a sump how its calculated. eg a 100l tank you want at least a 1000l/hr filter, I was wondering if this is the same calculation with a sump or would the pump just be to pump the water at the correct speed through the sump, which you answered with the sump levels, which I now understand a bit more
 
So are they more noisy than external filters?