Hi well i dont know either to put it in this thread of the DIY thread but here goes my questions.

Well I was lookiing at sumps and how they are done. And I was wondering is it possible using 2 or 3 tanks that are like 10-15gal tanks. And is it possible and can it be done?

It could be done. You would need an overflow and return hose for every tank, which means a pump for each tank. Pumps aren't cheap. It would be more economical in the long run, both from an energy and initial cost standpoint, to get one larger tank and one larger pump. You'd also have a lot of hoses and electrical cords running every which way. I can see where it would be tempting if the 10s and 15s were available free or cheap, but I think the additional costs would outweigh the benefit of cheap or free tanks.

To maximize the effectiveness of the sumps you'd also want filtration on each sump, and probably a heater. I see where this could be an advantage if you wanted to attempt different types of filtration in each sump, as the technique is often used by saltwater hobbyists to provide extra volume, to maintain filtration and heating out of sight rather than in the show tank, for algal scrubbers and for refugiums. Think it could be a PITA with minimal advantage for the average freshwater aquarium, though.

Just my 2 cents.

WYite

I was wondering do I really need an over flow? And can I just have a tube to siphon it while matching the return pump?

Now you're talkin' old school. Trust me siphon tubes are the very manifestation of arse pain. Some cheapo easy sump ideas:
Sterilite totes from WalMart or Big Lots. The plastic is easier to cut and drill than the glass, lighter and doesn't break when you slip and drop stuff in it (voice of experience speaking to you here again). I get 30 gallon recycling totes from WalMart (or I guess you could just liberate one from that crabby neibor next collection day) for $8 and just fill it with layers of foam and some poly batts on top of a couple layers of scrubbies. Got a 600 gph commie Chinese pump from Kens for about $25, some fittings, hose, pvc and away you go. You can get fancy with some egg crate light diffuser cut up and zip tied into a support cage to keep everything up off of the bottom but I pefer to let mine sit in about three inches of water. The upper portions support aerobic bacteria while the bottom houses the anerobics (I do have a layer of SeaChem Matrix down there as well. As lazy as it sounds it is and it filters 100 gallons of tank wonderfully. For occassional polishing I'll add a layer of five micron felt for a day but that's about it. The foam and poly gets rinsed maybe every other month and the sump will get sucked out at the same time but not much else to do. Oops, I also throw a bag of Purigen in front of the pump pick up as a precaution against any sudden increase in bioload that the tanks bacteria haven't responded to yet, but even that lasts for 3-4 months before it ever gets close to needing regenerating. To be perfectly honest it works every bit as good as the FX-5 that I have on my 125...and that cost enough to pay for a bunch of the cheapskate alternatives.

If you're into charcoal and resins and all of that you can also buy one of the Sterilite plastic three drawer organizers and drill a crap load of holes in the bottom of each drawer. I'm seriously lazy so this has no appeal for me but I've seen some salt water folks do a great job with them. The water comes in through a hole in the top of the case and flows thru a folded up sheet of WalMart poly batt, then drips down to the 2nd drawer that has a big chunk of foam or a bunch of scrubbies stacked on edge like poker chips in a tray. Then the water drips thru the bottom of that drawer into the bottom drawer. There you could use media bags of carbon, resin or just fill it with lava rock or bio balls. The whole thing sits on a couple of plastic soda bottle tops that are hot glued or silicone on by their caps to keep the bottom drawer a couple of inches off of the bottom and then all of that sits in a big plastic tote. The return pump sits in the bottom of the tote and most of them have some sort of small sponge inside or you can pull the cover off of the intake and adapt a reticulated sponge or other prefilter as a final. I guess the cool part about this set up is that it's easy as heck to service or change media around since you just pull out a drawer. Some of them get real fancy and fabricate short walls or dividers in each drawer with the holes in the drawer bottoms just on opposite ends from each other.
This creates a sort of horizontal weir that lengthens the travel for the water before it leaves giving it more exposure to the relative media as well as helping to settle out larger solids more efficiently. You can make the dividers out of just about any old plastic or just slice up a plastic shoe box from the Dollar Store and silicone it in place.

As for overflows, you can get a cheap one shot glass drill on Ebay or make your own safety siphon out of PVC that'll hang or sit next to or behind the tank. Most of them tend to loose their siphon periodically from air bubbles entering and slowly accumulating at the top of the turn. You can remedy this by drilling a hole a bit smaller than a piece of air tubing (silicone is best). Cut the end of the tubing on an angled point to make it easier to get started in the hole and grab it with a pair of pliers to pull it thru the hole a bit. You can either hook the other end to the air inlet on a power head or get a cheap Luft air pump that provides suction rather than positive pressure to keep the air cleared. Instead of the fancy bulkhead fittings you can buy a threaded female coupling and a threaded male coupling for PVC pipe at Lowes or H.D. (Lowes around us has the best selection and the Lasco fittings that they stock are more square shouldered so that they provide a much better seal surface). They'll have just about any size that you might want from 1/2" all the way up to 2". Also in the plumbing aisles you can get an o-ring or two to fit snuggly around the pipe. Drill a 1" hole for 1" pipe and twist the male adapter threaded end thru the hole with an o-ring on each side of the glass. Then twist the female coupling on and tighten it up against the o-ring, making sure that the one on the opposite side of the glass is also snug, and your ready to go. Elbows and adapters will let you design any kind of overflow pick-up and out fall that you want, and it's all cheaper than the aquarium specialty fittings. If you can't find the right size o-rings (Harbor Freight is another good cheap source) just glob a ring of pure silicone around each side of the hole before tightening up the fittings, and then just wait for it to dry and degas for at least a whole day.

Just make sure that you mark the inside of your sump with a fill line that will tell you how much the sump can handle when the power goes out. Also helpful if you place another overflow drain just above that line just in case and run that outflow into a house drain or at least a big bucket just in case.

Golden rule of aquarium sump living...it will over flow, it's only a question of when and whether you'll be out of town when it happens. Experience whispers yet again...

Mcmastercarr.com will cover just about any weirdo part o-ring or anything else for that matter.

Are you reinforcing your walmart totes? The sterilite ones I've gotten for temporary turtle quarters are fine up until you hit half full, then they start to bow out. Fairly more expensive, but there's a Tractor Supply by me that has rubbermaid livestock tubs that are pretty near indestructible.

The ones that I picked up are a more rigid plastic than the normal Sterilite, I may have misspoke...these are made by Pioneer Plastics and have a pretty tightly rolled lip and vertical ribs that the Sterilites don't have. Where I have used the others you can add a piece of PVC as a stiffener and use a large duct zip tie to hold it in place, or cut a slot the length of the pipe and fit it over the long side.

Yeah, I've used them too, sumps, stock tanks, etc. Also built a plywood tank and strapped it with duct slips to hold a piece of left over pond liner. Needed an emergency pond for a bunch of koi babies one day and that was the handiest pile of bits. 240 gallon tank out of left overs and junk. Still works fine when I need it.

As a general rule I try to stick with cheap, recycled and whatever I have laying around whenever possible. All of my tanks are rehabs or rebuilds, as are most of my filters and pumps. Thought that it would save me money...Hah! All it did was further enable my habit. Took the money saved and spent it on the fish anyway. Fish keeping seems to function like a gas in relation to my disposable income. However much there was always seems to evaporate when I start spendin' on the finned ones.

By any chance do you have pics?

Not handy at the moment but let me see what I can find.

http://www.twofishguyz.com/

Here's a link to Hans' site, the guy I got the foam idea from, and you might be able to see some of this in his old set up that is shown on the site. The new system is much larger but still functions the same.

Okay and ya I got me a sump and have a question for it in my overflow thread. But ya still going to build me another sump.

Not trying to be a D.H. but I couldn't understand your last post. You have a sump...? And you have another thread going about an overflow? The other thread is where you posted another question about this project?
Am I close? I'll go look now.

Where do I look when I enter the site because all I see is discus this and that.