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What sizes and part do i need for a overflow, return pump, etc piping parts?
My company is selling lots of stuff and im planning on buying some parts for my next build, no experience with a tank with a sump and overflow, thats why im asking?
I know i need couple check valves, 90s, 45s etc, but whats the most common sizes, 1”, 3/4”?
Any advice guys
Im planing to buy a tank around 75 gallons.
Thanks for reading
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I like to do drains with 1.5”, and return lines 3/4”, for most tanks.
I hard-plumb drain lines, and soft-plumb return lines
Check valves will ALWAYS fail, eventually. My approach is if you design a system that depends on a check valve to not leak or flood... it’s a poor design.
I hard-plumb drains straight from the bulkhead to the sump, with a union or two for future un-doing, and maybe a gate valve if you are going to run a dual-drain design.
I soft-plumb returns from a threaded/barb adapter on the return pump to a threaded / barb adapter on the return bulkhead. I rarely use any valves or check valves on the return line, unless I’m T’ing off to some sort of manifold.
PVC piping, unions, valves, and various elbows or T’s get from a Home Depot or Lowe’s. Most of the barbed adapters, locline, bulkheads, or other aquarium-specialty parts buy from a LFS or online.
I have now plumbed several hundred+ aquariums and can visualize a full plumbing parts list in my head. When I first started I found it very helpful to draw out a full diagram and label every part: “90* elbow”, “thread x slip 1inch bulkhead”, “1inch male slip to 3/4 inch reducer barb”..
Good luck!
I think a lot depends on what you’re trying to accomplish. I run a 55g with a 1/2” return line coupled with a 3/4” siphon drain and a 1” emergency drain. I actually ran fairly small plumbing on my 100g with a 1/2” return, 1/2” siphon drain, a 3/4” secondary drain and a 1” emergency drain. I could run a larger return and drain but there’s really no point in my case as I’m only putting around 4x turnover through my sump anyways and I don’t want to have a roaring waterfall in my living room. As it stands, my plumbing is dead silent and gives my sump plenty of flow to do the job. Now if I had everything plumbed through a wall and into a dedicated fish room and noise wasn’t a concern, then I’d consider going bigger on plumbing sizes to feed additional frag tanks etc.
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This right here, exactly what I do as well.Quote:
Originally Posted by LotsaFishies
Only add to this is I may buy unions and gate valves online cheaper than HD usually, and if you want colored PVC BRS for that.
Check valves are usually pointless, maybe if you had multiple tanks plumbed like a breeder station or something when you may not have a choice, but keeping return lines high up for early siphon break is best.