Help me tweak my overflow/sump

Please take a look at my youtube video and give me any advice on how to tweak my overflow and sump. I have the intake line ball valve closed off a little. The overflow wasnt taking in enough water and the water was cascading out of the overflow hole mixing with air and casing a lot of bubbles in the IN part of the sump. The output valve is fully open. I plan on placing my skimmer in the IN part of the sump. Any advice or comments are greatly appreciated!!! ;D

29g sump
1" inner diameter intake line with ball valve
3/4" inner diameter output line with ball valve
850GPH pump
I forget the GPH of the overflow

YouTube - Sump and overflow

 

Are the bubbles in the sump causing noise too?

Try sticking a piece of airline down the drain in the overflow box, moving it up and down until it goes quiet(er). Then find a dense piece of foam (I used one from my skimmer packing) and cut it to fit in the top of your overflow box to kill some more noise.

I found that the airline causes some huge bubbles in my sump and very loud splashing noises. Others haven't had a problem though and I'm sure that has its own fix.

Here is a video YouTube - quieting overflow box.mpg

 

im far from a expert but it think your return isnt keeping up with youre overflow. btw i dont think you need a valve on the drain.

 

I completely forgot all about the sponge that came with the overflow lol. I was to worried about an overflow of the tank and sump! My wife would kill me ;D

 

I kinda thought that too. I need a bigger pump. I put the valve on the drain line just a precaution.

 

Try using the foam or a combo if it and the airline.

I setup my overflow about six weeks ago and spent hours banging my head on the wall trying to tune it. I'm still only semi-satisfied with it.

As far as the flooding, I'm am SO paranoid about that too. I decided I wasn't willing to rely on the overflow (even if it was setup perfectly) because you never know when the siphon could fail. A snail or other kind of blockage could cause it to loose siphon or slow it down enough that the return pump out flows the overflow box draining. Here is what I came up with: http://www.3reef.com/forums/i-made/diy-display-tank-overflow-return-pump-kill-switch-105442.html

 

I just ordered the float switch! Thanks for the advice!

 

Put the foam tube over the pipe in your overflow box. It will slow the box down a little bit and help with the noise. Also you don't need the ball valve on the overflow box. That could be causing the bubbles that's going into your overflow box. Also, you want the pump to have a higher GPH then the overflow. You can put a ball valve on top of it, if it's too fast.