Plumbing

I'm ordering a Reeflo dart hybrid pump from Marinedepot.com (once they are in stock) to replace the two mag 12 pumps that I currently use on my freshwater 500 gallon tank. (I know is FW and this is a SW site, sorry) My question is can I run 1 1/2" plumbing on the inlet side of the pump instead of the 2"? The reason I ask is the cost of the 2" bulkheads, ball valves, and unions is way more than the 1 1/2" parts. Is using 1 1/2" parts going to be ok or should I just bite the ...

For the past 5 or 6 weeks, I've been avoiding the task of getting the 84" tall 265g poly tank out of the fishroom to clean it. It's easier with a second person, but with the Texas heat I've simply opted to put it off day after day after day. Well, at the same time my reef was at risk in case I needed saltwater for an emergency, not to mention the lack of water changes that couldn't be performed.

Friday night at 10pm, it was 103F outside. Since I was more motivated than usual, I decided ...

It has been a while since I have had the time to make any changes or upgrades to my tank let alone post anything on here but this morning I finally got around to getting my diy auto top off up and running to get this one mounted I got a left over piece of pvc from my closed loop setup and used a bastard file and my dremel to cut a notch on both sides of the pipe so it would have a snug fit over the acrylic that makes up the sump. using heat shrink and but clamps as well as wire nuts i not only extended ...

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I'm building my sump and wanted some ideas from y'all! Its a 20 gallon high. Will have three compartments. Fuge will be the smallest because of availibility of space. I want the return bigger so my heater can fit in the space. The tape in bottom of tank shows where I was thinking of putting baffles. What ya think? I will have 2 returns whereas the skimmer section will get 3/4 of water from return and the fuge will get 1/2 water. Heres pic:

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So I am trying to figure out the best way to set up the closed loop on my new tank. Here is a sketchup model of how the tank is currently drilled/plumbed.

I want to use all four 1" bulkhead as outlets for the closed loop, so I am thinking about drilling another hole as the inlet for my iwaki. Like this.

With the black circle being the new 1.5" inlet ...