How do I pull this off? Preferably no siphon so I don't accidentally drain the tank onto the floor when my room inevitably has a power outage. I have a 40 that I want to hook up to a 10 gallon.
Gotcha, don't know why I never thought of the sump getting pumped into the main tank. Always thought it would be the main tank overflowing the sump.Your only safe option is an overhead sump. HOB overflows have the inherent risk of breaking siphon. There are precautions that can be taken, such as an airlifter pump, to remove the air bubbles that tend to gather in the top of the siphon tube, but you are depending on that pump to always work. If the siphon breaks, all the water in the sump is pumped into the display tank, risking an overflow and burned out pump. Nothing is absolutely foolproof, but with an overhead sump, all you are depending on is gravity, which has a pretty good track record of consistently working over the millennia. Power goes off, pump quits - you're still good