the VanSiphon

good thing, and thanks...hopefully this works well for me and I will be using it on some other tanks as well if it does.

**edit- just got home from Lowes I'll try to remember to take pics**

 

Anyone foresee an issue with putting the 2" section down under the stand so that only the one 3/4" pipe is showing from above?

 

Yes! If you look at the diagram, the drop tube (labeled #2) inside the 2" pipe is the water level that is needed to keep the siphon going.

Basically, the either end of pipe #1 has to be under water, this is the siphon. Pipe #2 is essentially the overflow, bringing water to the sump. The arrow I have marked "Water level inside bulkhead" is controlled by where the top of pipe #2 is located.

So if you make the siphon so #2 is higher, the waterlevel in the bulkhead will be higher, and thus less noisy, however since the water doesn't drop as far in the siphon, it will also not siphon as fast. Good for a smaller tank.

If you make #2 lower, the siphon will work much faster but since water will be dropping in the bulkhead further it may be noisier . Too low and it will start sucking bubbles down and in, endangering the siphon.

It won't work at all if the top of #2 is below the level of the pipe inside the tank.

Rick

 

Thanks Rick...it's been a long few days, completely missed it. Good news is I haven't started building yet. I went and got the rest of the stuff to finish my stand and refugium/sump. Hopefully have a complete build thread going soon!

 

getting started and double checking everything

 

Looks good so far! What kind of endcaps are you using for the 2"PVC? Looks a lot smaller, which is nice. Does it have the strength to hold? There will be a few cups of water that will stay inside the PVC which will weigh it down a bit.

Make sure that the pipes inside the PVC overlap next to eachother.

 

I decided to go with 3" for that part to have a little more room to work. The end caps look flimsy but they are pretty stiff, I am using PVC glue and then some silicone on them...they were the only ones they had that were flat. The tubes offset each other and over lap by about an inch or more. Hope by the end of the day I will have it done. What kind of paint did you use on the PVC? You painted the bulkhead piece inside the tank as well correct?

 

Cool! I'm looking forward to seeing how it works! That's the cool thing about sharing ideas...seeing what different material and ideas people come up with to improve ideas!

I just used some flat black spray paint on mine. Seemed to do fine without any ill effects. It does scratch pretty easily, but that wasn't a problem. The back of my tank is also black, so that hid it well, and a nice layer of coraline and you hardly see it.

 

It's running wide open and so is my return on this test. My return will have a little more head and some elbows so I am sure it will slow down some after that. Works great, ran it for a while like this and have it all torn down and ready to start gluing and fitting it to the stand.

Thanks Rick!! You can check out my build thread and see how I have the stand and everything setup with your VanSiphon

 

Nice! Looks like you have a good flow for a 20g setup!

Are those caps that you used normal plumbing caps? I can't say as that I've seen them, but I haven't looked anywhere but the PVC section.