NEW Tank build starts here

[sphelps]

For me it depends, 10x is probably a good ball park within reason but the larger the tank to more this becomes impractical if the goal is efficiency and low noise. Going up 10ft I wouldn't aim for more than 1000 gph so a little under 10x in your case. Make up the rest with MP10s or whatever.

What's your overflow and plumbing plans?

[DAVE]

You want your return pump to match your skimmer output.

There is no point in putting 10x the flow through your sump if your skimmer isn't going to be able to handle the water volume that is moving through your sump.

Since you are planning on an LPS dominant system with a few SPS and you are already going to be running MP10's then there is no need to get crazy with your return pump, just have it match or be a little less then your skimmer pump.

[DAVE]

i.e. your skimmer pump is pushing X amount GPH, then your return pump (factoring head loss) should be X amount.

[sphelps]

Originally Posted by Hydrologist

i.e. your skimmer pump is pushing X amount GPH, then your return pump (factoring head loss) should be X amount.

You're know they are interdependent right? I never understood this approach, design you're sump properly and it will trap lighter organics in the skimmer chamber regardless or display tank turnover. I'd base my tank turnover more on the size of the display and what's needed to effectively surface skim filter out suspended particles/debris.

[DAVE]

Please explain how these are independent.


Your return pump is pulling exactly the same amount of water that is entering the sump. If it wasn't the tank level in your DT or sump would either decrease or increase to the point of overflowing (or draining).

[sphelps]

Your return pump flow rate is independent from your skimmer flow rate, hence matching them doesn't serve a purpose. Unless you feed your overflow water directly into your skimmer you have no way of really assuring overflow water isn't bypassed anyway. Typically a skimmer sits in a sump chamber, and water flows through the chamber to the next. You'll have a very hard time trying to come up with a system that insure overflow water enters your skimmer only once prior to moving on and that no water from the overflow can bypass the skimmer before moving on. Your skimmer is already designed with the correct pump for skimmer contact time so you're better off insuring your skimmer chamber gets a decent turnover rate, once equilibrium hits and your skimmer is sized accordingly to bio load it really makes no difference what turnover rate your sump skimmer sees. It makes more sense to size your return pump to properly skim your display tank and keep organics from settling.

[DAVE]

Originally Posted by sphelps

Your return pump flow rate is independent from your skimmer flow rate, hence matching them doesn't serve a purpose. Unless you feed your overflow water directly into your skimmer you have no way of really assuring overflow water isn't bypassed anyway. Typically a skimmer sits in a sump chamber, and water flows through the chamber to the next. You'll have a very hard time trying to come up with a system that insure overflow water enters your skimmer only once prior to moving on and that no water from the overflow can bypass the skimmer before moving on. Your skimmer is already designed with the correct pump for skimmer contact time so you're better off insuring your skimmer chamber gets a decent turnover rate, once equilibrium hits and your skimmer is sizes accordingly to bio load it really makes no difference what turnover rate your sump skimmer chamber sees. It makes more sense to size your return pump to properly skim your display tank and keep organics from settling.

Your right you can't be assured your skimmer is going to skim all the water coming into the chamber, hence the reason why you try and match it.

You want to try and "Capture" as much water from the DT with your skimmer as possible. Obviously your skimmer is not going to get all the water from your DT, but why would you want your DT draining twice as much water as the skimmer can take up? Ultimately, you are limited by your drains and how much they can handle (depends on the method you want to employ here). A herbie or Bean method can handle much more water then a standard durso.

The other variable at play here is your sump size. Having a smallish sump with a HUGE pump is going to move the water through the sump WAY to fast and really defeat the purpose of the sump. (that is if the purpose of your sump is to filter your DT water)

I don't use my return pump to keep organics from settling, I use powerheads. My return pump is used to get water from the DT to the sump for filtration.