Hey everyone, I have a 56 gal marineland column and really want to set up a sump. The thought of a HOB overflow scares me a little. Started to buy a lifereef but the are outragouse for a HOB. Thinking seriously about just drilling it myself but have heard of ppl cracking there tanks from to much stress around the wholes. Looking for some advice! Best place to drill... Middle or corner? Should I drill for the return also or just over the top. Should I do the herbie or beananimal? How far from the top or sides should I drill? I'm gonna have a nervouse breakdown if I don't figure out something. Lol thanks for any help.
Herbie overflow
- Thread starter jswizzle
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Glass holes is easy to deal with. Don't hesitate to order from them.
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If you're in the Rome area I'll be happy to help you out
Slow down and figure out WHERE u want your overflow. If your going to do a BeanAnimal then I suggest a coast to coast. Otherwise, you want it in a non conspicuous spot.
Are u drilling the bottom to use a stand pipe or the back?
I will have to drill the back. Pretty sure the bottom is tempered. Unfortunately Im no where near there. Just worried about a snail or something getting stuck in the drain on the glass wholes type. Also, as crazy as it sounds I'm gonna drill it where it's at, gonna drain most of the water out and do it with livestock still in it. Took me forever to get my rockscape and corals like I want them and don't wanna take a chance on messing that up.
Here is a link to the original Beananimal style from the guy who came up with it. Read the whole thing. It is well worth the time. I used this when planning mine, building the overflow, drilling the tank and plumbing. I will never use anything but a Bean Animal if I can help it. I love mine.
http://www.beananimal.com/projects/silent-and-fail-safe-aquarium-overflow-system.aspx">http://www.beananimal.com/projects/silent-and-fail-safe-aquarium-overflow-system.aspx</a>
If you are interested, I can shoot you a link to my build thread where you can see it in progress.
http://www.beananimal.com/projects/silent-and-fail-safe-aquarium-overflow-system.aspx">http://www.beananimal.com/projects/silent-and-fail-safe-aquarium-overflow-system.aspx</a>
If you are interested, I can shoot you a link to my build thread where you can see it in progress.
Just use one of the glass holes deals. A snail getting caught on any overflow is inevitable. You need to oversize it a bit to compensate for it. I use one on a thirty gallon and it's never been a problem. If you want to use the Herbie method, glass-holes will build one with two holes in it for you.
I don't think it would be a problem. Especially if it has a rim on it. In addition, the pressure from the tank will be exerted below where the holes are drilled because the overflow box will be mostly empty. There will be some pressure exerted on the outside of the overflow box. That will transfer through the acrylic (or glass) of the box to the side of the tank but will be minimal and will be spread out for the length of the box. The trickest part is while it is being drilled. The key is very little pressure on the bit and lots of water to wash away the glass particles while drilling.
Edit:
While I would never say never, I tried to defeat that by cutting a thin slot and building a cover for my overflow box. If a snail is small enough to fit through the slot I don't think he will be big enough to get caught in one of the ball valves. Knock on wood. LOL
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Edit:
While I would never say never, I tried to defeat that by cutting a thin slot and building a cover for my overflow box. If a snail is small enough to fit through the slot I don't think he will be big enough to get caught in one of the ball valves. Knock on wood. LOL
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It really isn't hard to do at all. Are you handy at all? I could walk you through it. The only tools you would need is a drill and a saw. Preferably a table saw but it can be done with other types as well. For materials all you need is a bit (you can get one from HD depending on the size of the bulkhead) acrylic, weld on and a small tube of silicone. Or, if you wanted to make the trip down this way some Saturday I would be happy to help you out. I may even have enough weld on left over for the little bit we would need.
I would say I'm pretty good at doing stuff. I'm definitely a do it yourselfer. I just sometiimes stress a lil on things that I haven't really attempted before. Especially when it comes to possibly destroying a reef tank I've invested so much in. And I have plenty of tools, except for the bit. I'll have to get one of those. Looked at homedepot but they said they didn't have them. If u could shoot me a pm with ur phone number, I'd like to give u a call and maybe get u to walk me through the steps if u don't mind.
Ok, here comes the 21 questions. Lol I guess I'll just start making a list. Gonna throw some at u now and then prolly some more once I get some stuff together and get closer to actually drilling.
1. What size bulkheads are u using and does it matter exactly on that.
2. What's the thickness of the acrylic ur using and again is there a min or max that u suggest.
3.What size slot did u cut in ur acrylic for the overflow..... Ok, dumb question, I'm guess the thickness of the blade on ur table saw. Lol.
4. How do I know how long the hole needs to be to handle the flow? (how long is urs and whats ur flow rate.) WHOA!! That sounded weird!
5. What's ur demintions on ur wholes from center to center and also from top of ur tank to center.
6. I see that some ppl recommend doing the coast to coast overflow. I also see that urs is not. Do u recommend either way for my tank.
7. I have heard of ppl cracking there tanks from hard plumbing everything and bumping a pipe and cracking the glass. Should I stop the hard pipe and start flex pipe at some point.
Ok, I think I'm done for now. I hope these questions don't seem to stupid. I'm sure I could prolly just wing it on some of them but I'm just trying to see what u think seeing as how urs is functional. Thanks.
1. What size bulkheads are u using and does it matter exactly on that.
2. What's the thickness of the acrylic ur using and again is there a min or max that u suggest.
3.What size slot did u cut in ur acrylic for the overflow..... Ok, dumb question, I'm guess the thickness of the blade on ur table saw. Lol.
4. How do I know how long the hole needs to be to handle the flow? (how long is urs and whats ur flow rate.) WHOA!! That sounded weird!
5. What's ur demintions on ur wholes from center to center and also from top of ur tank to center.
6. I see that some ppl recommend doing the coast to coast overflow. I also see that urs is not. Do u recommend either way for my tank.
7. I have heard of ppl cracking there tanks from hard plumbing everything and bumping a pipe and cracking the glass. Should I stop the hard pipe and start flex pipe at some point.
Ok, I think I'm done for now. I hope these questions don't seem to stupid. I'm sure I could prolly just wing it on some of them but I'm just trying to see what u think seeing as how urs is functional. Thanks.
No such thing as a stupid question. 
And like I said in the PM, posting them here helps others see the answers and may help them. Plus, others will join in with ideas that very well may be better than mine. (usually the case). LOL
1. I am using 1". Depending on the pump you choose you could go with 3/4" for that size of a tank. My thoughts were that I don't want to limit myself based on pipe size. Bigger is better in most cases. Besides, the bit I borrowed was sized for 1" bulkheads.
2. I am using 1/4" thick acrylic. It was scrape that came out of some electrical equipment and I got it for free. Hard to beat free. I would try to go with something as close to that as you can find. Much thinner and it will bow more than you like. In my case it is rock solid. With thinner material you could build some internal supports but that complicates it.
3. I started with a single pass on the table saw but that just didn't look right so I adjusted the fence a bit and made a second pass. Seems to work well with good flow through it.
4. Oh now you are getting personal! LOL I didn't use anything scientific when I did mine. The length of the overflow box was dictated by the size of the material I had on hand and I just cut the slot as long as I could while still leaving enough support at the ends. If the box were much longer, I would have cut multiple slots leaving intermediate supports in the middle. I have never calculated flow rates but my pump runs wide open and is rated at 1650 gal/hr. Some of that has been diverted to the skimmer and to the reactor but I ran it initially with the entire flow to the tank in testing.
5. I forget the exact dimensions but the holes are like 4 or 5 inches center to center. They can be more or less if you like. Just keep in mind that you need to be able to get your fingers in there later so more room helps. The 90 degree elbows in the box are not glued and I remove them at start up to help the air work out of the system and keep it running dead silent. I tried to get the holes as close to the top as I could so that the box didn't need to be any deeper.
6. Full coast-2-coast has big advantages in skimming all the surface of the tank. In my case, I didn't have 6' long acrylic so that stopped that. LOL The other disadvantage of a c-2-c is that it will shade the back wall of the tank. In my case, the right side of the tank is shaded a bit on the back wall limiting what I can put back there. In a full c-2-c that problem would be magnified.
7. I suppose it is very possible to crack the tank by bumping hard pipe. In my opinion, if I am that clumsy it doesn't much matter if it is hard pipe or hose. LOL Big advantages though to hose I think but it was a matter of cost for me. I didn't want to drop the extra cash on expensive hoses when PVC Pipe was so cheap. To make my build happen, I had to go cheap or it wasn't going to get built. If you do go with hoses, make sure they are not clear. If light can get in, algae will grown and you will have problems down the road.
Hope all that helps. Don't be afraid to throw out any more questions you might have.
Rich
And like I said in the PM, posting them here helps others see the answers and may help them. Plus, others will join in with ideas that very well may be better than mine. (usually the case). LOL1. I am using 1". Depending on the pump you choose you could go with 3/4" for that size of a tank. My thoughts were that I don't want to limit myself based on pipe size. Bigger is better in most cases. Besides, the bit I borrowed was sized for 1" bulkheads.
2. I am using 1/4" thick acrylic. It was scrape that came out of some electrical equipment and I got it for free. Hard to beat free.
I would try to go with something as close to that as you can find. Much thinner and it will bow more than you like. In my case it is rock solid. With thinner material you could build some internal supports but that complicates it.3. I started with a single pass on the table saw but that just didn't look right so I adjusted the fence a bit and made a second pass. Seems to work well with good flow through it.
4. Oh now you are getting personal! LOL I didn't use anything scientific when I did mine. The length of the overflow box was dictated by the size of the material I had on hand and I just cut the slot as long as I could while still leaving enough support at the ends. If the box were much longer, I would have cut multiple slots leaving intermediate supports in the middle. I have never calculated flow rates but my pump runs wide open and is rated at 1650 gal/hr. Some of that has been diverted to the skimmer and to the reactor but I ran it initially with the entire flow to the tank in testing.
5. I forget the exact dimensions but the holes are like 4 or 5 inches center to center. They can be more or less if you like. Just keep in mind that you need to be able to get your fingers in there later so more room helps. The 90 degree elbows in the box are not glued and I remove them at start up to help the air work out of the system and keep it running dead silent. I tried to get the holes as close to the top as I could so that the box didn't need to be any deeper.
6. Full coast-2-coast has big advantages in skimming all the surface of the tank. In my case, I didn't have 6' long acrylic so that stopped that. LOL The other disadvantage of a c-2-c is that it will shade the back wall of the tank. In my case, the right side of the tank is shaded a bit on the back wall limiting what I can put back there. In a full c-2-c that problem would be magnified.
7. I suppose it is very possible to crack the tank by bumping hard pipe. In my opinion, if I am that clumsy it doesn't much matter if it is hard pipe or hose. LOL Big advantages though to hose I think but it was a matter of cost for me. I didn't want to drop the extra cash on expensive hoses when PVC Pipe was so cheap. To make my build happen, I had to go cheap or it wasn't going to get built. If you do go with hoses, make sure they are not clear. If light can get in, algae will grown and you will have problems down the road.
Hope all that helps. Don't be afraid to throw out any more questions you might have.
Rich
What type of bulkheads are u using. I noticed on the beananimal sight, it says he is using slip x slip. If that's the case, how do u keep it from leaking on the back side of the tank because if u glue the PVC together at the bulkhead then u would not ever be able to remove the bulkhead if needed.
I used slip to slip as well. I put unions in the drain lines but yes, if the bulkhead needs to come out down the road I will have to cut it out. Leave some pipe between the bulkhead and the sanitary tee so that if that happens, you can cut it close to the bulkhead and still have room to glue it back into a new bulkhead or a coupling. But, the only what I would see needing to remove it is if a rubber gasket failed. If you make sure you can remove the tops of the sanitary tees you can always clean the inside of the vertical pipe from the top and the horizontal from inside the tank.
While you can use threaded fittings, they tend to leak more. If you do use them, make sure you use teflon tape on the threads. As for glue, go to the plumbing section and get the stuff for plumbing PVC. Electrical PVC glue will not be water tight. To ensure it is water tight, you need both the purple primer and the glue. Because there is little or now pressure on the system you can get by without the primer but there is a risk in it. The reason people don't want to use the primer is because it is messy and it looks bad. In my case, I did all the plumbing in the garage and driveway so I didn't care if some got on the slab. It also allowed me to fill with tap water and do a good leak check before moving everything into the house.
