Plumbing for Dummies: What's the ball valve for?

JoJosReef

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I've read that you get your sump, return pump flow and tank levels sorted out, then you start tightening the ball valve to reduce noise in overflow tubes to the sump. My questions:
1. Doesn't tightening the ball valve reduce the flow of water down the drain pipes?
2. If the water flow coming from the drain pipes is reduced, won't that reduce the volume in the sump and increase the volume in the display? Or is the flow rate the same, just through a smaller aperture?
3. Am I missing something?

Thanks!
 

Subsea

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#2. Within limits, you reduce noise only when you restrict cross sectional area of flow with a ball valve. Restricting flow with ball valve introduces a problem of getting plugged up. Check out these two options for noise abatement:



“I decided to finally quiet down my CPR CS90 overflow after years of the gurgling and sucking sound in the background. Wow! What a difference!? It only took about 10 minutes to build. Since I had to wait 24 hours for the glue to dry right for safety for the system, after building the Durso. I decided to use the Stockman standpipe first because no glue is needed.”

“Doing research, I found the Durso type standpipe first (LINK). I watched a couple of videos and decided to give it a try. A few hours later, I started putting my parts list together, then I discovered this thread here on R2R (LINK). I read through the thread, and it was suggested that the Stockman standpipe is quieter than the Durso standpipe. Then, I found a video on how to make a Stockman standpipe. I decided to stay with the Stockman standpipe because it worked.”
 

PharmrJohn

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About 15 years ago I had ball valves all over the place in my plumbing. In each of my PVC lengths in fact. But back in the day, we didn't have any DC pumps, so the ball valves were there to control flow in every part of my system. With my upcoming build, tho, I'm only going to have ball valves available to me in the outgoing water flow and the return, just in case. What I AM going to do is populate my plumbing with quick disconnects (coupling) for each length of pipe, so I can disconnect the sump and pull it out if need be. They are also useful in adding lengths of PVC if you add something to your sump that requires it.
 

Jimbo327

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The gate valves on the drain lines is to slow the flow, so that the water level is maintained higher in the overflow box. This will reduce the gurgling sound when it is at full uncontrolled drain, and reduce splashing sounds as the water drops into the overflow box from the DT. You will only need 1 gate valve on the main drain, don't need on the other drains lines as the water level in overflow can be maintained by the main drain line gate valve.
 

Troylee

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The gate valves on the drain lines is to slow the flow, so that the water level is maintained higher in the overflow box. This will reduce the gurgling sound when it is at full uncontrolled drain, and reduce splashing sounds as the water drops into the overflow box from the DT. You will only need 1 gate valve on the main drain, don't need on the other drains lines as the water level in overflow can be maintained by the main drain line gate valve.
This!!^^^^^^
 

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