Being on trips / away from the tank

[travis32]

I was thinking about this as the summer and camping season comes up.

The biggest worry I have is related to the overflow and sump. Is it o.k. to turn the return pump off, and not use the sump until I get back from trips (usually just weekenders, 3 to 4 days.)

What impact would that have on the reef? Lights and stuff would still be on timers.

My skimmer is a HOB skimmer so, the tank would still be arated and I have a HOB penguin filter just to mainly run carbon.

Would anything bad happen to the ecological structure if the sump wasn't in use for 3 or 4 days? (Heater is in the Skimmer return reservoir.)

The alternative is to have someone check on the tank a couple days while I'm gone. It would just give me greater piece of mind if I reduced or completely eliminated the possibility of something overflowing and shutting the power down to the tank. Which, I would think loss of power would be a greater loss to the tank than loss of the sump for 3 or 4 days.

[d0ughb0y]

Make a plan, and then do a practice run while you are still around. That's what I did before I went on a 21 day vacation trip last summer.

[scomar31]

I marked my sump so I know exactly how much water should be in the tank so that in the event of a power loss it won't overflow. I did a dry run and shut off all power and watched it until all water had drained to make sure I was good.

[radicaltimes]

If the water in the sump isn't moving it will go bad and stink . I'm gone a lot and always worry about the return pump quitting. I'm getting ready to go to the Keys for 8 days. I'm thinking
about putting one of my old powerheads in the sump with a 1/2 inch hose on it running to the Display tank. If the main pump goes out it will keep water in the sump moving and the ATO will keep water level where it is suppsed to be

[travis32]

Yeah I have the sump marked out and have tested many times the effect of shutting things down. ( LIke when I turn pumps off to feed once in a while.) Not all the time, but sometimes.)

I let it sit 15 to 20 minutes to make sure the ATO isn't filling it too full etc.. It gets within 1" of the top, but doesn't overflow.

I"m more concerned about something plugging up the overflow and causing the DT to overflow.

IT's happened once. I glued netting over the overflow box with epoxy. So far it's held against multiple snails, though 1 astrea snail just made it into the overflow yesterday. He wasn't big enough to damage the siphon and he found his wait out.

A large cerinth snail hasn't been able to get in, not for lack of trying. Dumb things are attracted to overflow boxes I swear. I want to prevent the DT from overflowing then the Return pump burning out. I feel the sump levels are within safety parameters.