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Back in the Water, Powder's tank tale

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Powder

Baxreefs said:
The "under sand" return is an interesting idea. I assume that there are holes only in the very end of the piping above the sand?

Just be sure to drill a 1/8" hole as a siphon break in the return line about 1" below the normal water line in the tank. Other wise it can siphon water and sand back to the sump and cause a real mess ... not that anything like that has ever happened to me ::)
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You are correct just the caps have holes drilled in them. Before I filled the tank I ran water up from the sump and tried different sizes and numbers of holes in each cap to try and get a fairly even amount from each cap. The three at the far end got a little more flow. I have an inline one way valve and I also drilled a hole to break the siphon. As an added bonus the siphon hole makes some nice surface agitation.

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Phyl

Phyl

Officer Emeritus
Officer Emeritus
Ya know... it looks great in theory. Unfortunately in reality we have 2 siphon breaks on our 65 and have flooded the sump on shutoff due to them getting clogged. This HAS to be part of your daily maintenance. I could never be so dilligent and that setup scares the bejiggers out of me. I truly hope you have nothing but success with it. I just can't help but be worried about it! The one way valve doesn't work long term. We have one on our system and we still get siphon from our 180 when we shut off the flow to it.
 
P

Powder

Starting to show some life in the tank:
Side 1
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Side 2
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View from the end:
It is hard to tell but there is a cave that runs the length of the bigger rock pile. the Yellow tang loves to go back and forth in the tunnel.
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P

Powder

Baxreefs said:
Hows the subgrade laterals working out?
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It give a really nice even return flow this with a Koralia 3 and a 4 I don't see any dead spots. I am very OCD about cleaning and I make sure the syphon break hole is clear 4 or 5 times a week nothing yet. The hole has a steady flow out so it would be very noticeable if it became clogged.
 
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