Herbie Overflow - side mount without external box

[mattm]

I am in Richmond, VA and have been away from the hobby for some time.  I recently joined the site to follow the great builds and your neighboring reefing community.

 

I am currently planning out my new build and wanted to see if anyone had any ideas for a spin on a herbie overflow.  The tank will be a long rectangle coming in at ~42g.  The overflow will be side mounted (like a peninsula) but will be exposed.  My vision is to keep the back clear since the tank lacks depth.  What I am trying to eliminate is external box so I can 90 directly out of the bulkheads.

 

My two ideas so far are:

 

- Drill the holes vertically - The bottom is the full siphon and the top is a dry emergency that only gets engaged if the water rises in the overflow (indicating an issue with the primary drain

 

- Drill the holes side by side - The height of the grates in the weir would be different so the the dry emergency would only engage if the water height in the tank changed (indicating an issue with the primary drain

 

Both options would incorporate a slim internal weir seen on all of the slim overflows on the market today.

 

Please let me know any thoughts, concerns, or better yet, ideas yet to be considered.

[WheresTheReef]

Welcome!

 

Using an internal only overflow is/was very common. External overflows or hybrids (slim internal + external) really became popular since they reduce the drainage footprint in the tank.

By vertical do you mean drill the bottom? Not sure what you mean if it still includes a slim internal box. I had a vertical corner overflow in a RR 90g. I didn’t like how much room it took up in the tank. When I drilled my 120g I went with a shadow overflow, from synergy reef systems, with a small internal + external box. It is a peninsula tank.

 

What size pipe are you planning? You will need to check if your pvc elbows fit in a slim box. I have an internal slim overflow on my 30g. I don’t remember the brand. I had to trim the tops of the 3/4” elbows to get them to fit. I’ve drilled several tanks like this. I’ve always added a small vertical offset (emergency slightly higher) to allow for a good full siphon on the main drain.

 

With a herbie I have found the quietest to be when the emergency has a small trickle.

 

I know you want to see through the tank, but IMO it’s nicer to see a background color vs seeing plumbing. Whatever you decide make sure the glass isn’t tempered before you drill.

 

 

 

 

[YHSublime]

I'm not sure I really understand what you're asking, you're talking about a Herbie overflow, but I don't understand the 90 degree twists? 
When it comes to plumbing, 90 degree elbows are something that you want to keep to a minimum, none if possible. 
 
I have a small eshopps overflow I put in Herbie Style. The PO of the tank had a built in acrylic piece to make it an all in one, but that took up 25% of the tanks footprint. Like mentioned above, you don't want to take up all the real estate. 
 
The water flows through the slim box internally, held to an external box by a bulkhead and 2 washers. There are two bulkheads at the bottom of the external overflow box. One stays open, the other has a piece of PVC in it to raise the water level in the external box and slowly trickles down the emergency drain. The main drain has a ball valve installed on the plumbing which will raise or lower the water level in the external box depending on the drain flow restriction. You will want the valve to be as close to the drain as possible. 

[WheresTheReef]

1 hour ago, YHSublime said:

I'm not sure I really understand what you're asking, you're talking about a Herbie overflow, but I don't understand the 90 degree twists? 

I think he means to have an internal overflow box with bulkheads. There would be elbows on the outside portion of the bulkheads to direct flow straight down.

 

I have something similar to this on my 30g. Picture below is not mine, but illustrates the implementation that I went with. There are also elbows inside the box in opposite directions so one (facing down) can be a full siphon and the other (facing up) would be the emergency. Basically just need a way to offset the water level between the 2 drains. Maybe @mattm can provide a picture/illustration? If you go with an internal box like this it needs to be sealed (e.g. full box, or half box siliconed to the glass) so that the teeth level determines the tank’s water level. 

 

[mattm]

Thanks for trying to decipher my poor description. Basically, I am trying to incorporate a way to run a herbie with the look of a glass holes setup (no external box like on the Eclipse).

My plumbing will be on one end of the tank. For anyone who follows Scorched on Nano Reef, he runs his plumbing like this but on both ends. He does not run an internal weir but incorporates a number of other checks and balances to avoid disaster that is still living too dangerous for my tastes. Below are some examples of the idea for the external (his pics). What I am trying to figure out is how to design the weir that allows for an emergency backup.

[YHSublime]

I’m familiar with scorched, that’s the same version of my tank except 12 gallons. I, like you, wanted to Run peninsula. Why not just go with an external overflow box and put it in the back end if you haven’t drilled yet?

I’ve always found his plumbing situation to be, in my opinion, risky business.

[mattm]

The tank takes up all the available space and would not allow for it to be drilled in the back. If I went to a smaller tank, I could do it. Which is still an option but I was hoping for the to maximize the volume for the available space.

The XAqua is an option but it has no emergency and there’s mixed reviews on its sound.

Ive even considered a oversize canister like an FX6 with lily pipes...but I know what kind of divide that starts in effectiveness :-)

[YHSublime]

The tank takes up all the available space and would not allow for it to be drilled in the back. If I went to a smaller tank, I could do it. Which is still an option but I was hoping for the to maximize the volume for the available space.

The XAqua is an option but it has no emergency and there’s mixed reviews on its sound.

Ive even considered a oversize canister like an FX6 with lily pipes...but I know what kind of divide that starts in effectiveness :-)

Got it, function following form, or form following function.

What you’re seeing on scorcheds tank is small, you’re talking about 30+ gallons more. Wheresthereef had some good ideas about what u think you’re trying to do?

I’d personally reconsider the external overflow box. As you can see in my photo, I personally don’t believe it would be any more intrusive if you’re going to run piping down the side. The box pictured on my tank would also work on your side tank.

Another alternative is to not drill at all. You could get a HOB skimmer.

I know these are not options you’re considering, but it’s the safest way with the least amount of risk, imo.

[AlanM]

I had a weir in my tank with three bulkheads, three elbows inside, and no external box.  It was basically the same as what WheresTheReef posted above and worked well.  The pipes went straight down to the basement.  It's the classic BeanAnimal design.  He didn't have an external box either, but I think most people put the valves close to the sump these days instead of how he shows as up by the tank.  Most people also use a single gate valve instead of three ball valves.  https://beananimal.com/projects/silent-and-fail-safe-aquarium-overflow-system/  

 

Anyway, you want a very slim internal overflow box avoiding elbows inside the weir but you don't want an external box, so you'd have to get the heights right when drilling. Sorry, this might get long cause I have thought about plumbing a lot.

 

Using the BeanAnimal terms for the different drain functions, normally you want a single "Full Siphon" drain that carries the water full time from your pump.  This would be your lowest hole and should be as low as you can make it in that slim overflow box.  You never want it to see air or else it will get noisy and may convert out of being a full siphon.

 

Next you want an "Open Channel" which just gets a bare trickle of water in it or is basically right on the edge of getting a trickle of water.  This one will handle any obstruction in your full siphon once you get it tuned.  You want it to have a tiny trickle at steady state because as it picks up more water from anything obstructing your full siphon that's your adjustability built in.  It lets you have a range of operation for the valve on the full siphon pipe without having to hit the exact spot that the siphon starts and no-more/no-less.  Basically, you start closing the siphon valve until you hear it flush and push the air out, then turn it a tiny little bit more to keep it there which should cause a tiny amount of water to start coming down that open channel.

 

Lastly would be the "Dry Emergency" which is dry all the time and should be completely out of the water, but below your tank rim.

 

The problem with what you want to do is that the water height in the overflow box will need to run at a level where there's just a trickle of water down the open channel hole.  That means your open channel hole would need to be drilled so that the bottom of the hole is close to the "weir" which is the edge of your overflow box (to avoid waterfall noise in the overflow box).  You could drill it lower, but then you're talking about water falling pretty far into the overflow which will not be quiet.  You'll probably see the bulkhead on it coming up above the weir.  That's fine if you're ok with that. 

 

You'll need to drill the emergency one even higher so that the bottom of it is above the water level in the overflow box at all times.

 

As you can see, it's easier to make the overflow box deep enough to hold some elbows which lets you drill all three holes at the same height and adjust where the opening sees water by rotating the elbow down/up like WheresTheReef posted.  I made a box like he posted and used 1.5" street elbows like he posted where one side of the elbow goes directly into the bulkhead and ended up being able to make the box just 2" deep which I felt was pretty slim at the time.

 

An external overflow box, like YHSublime suggests, is a good way to hide those plumbing considerations in the outside box and keep the internal box small.  I think it's also cleaner than the photos you posted.  You're bringing all those height considerations from the inside to the outside and handling them by making the pipes different heights in the box. 

 

One caution with the external box is that the bulkheads that move water from the internal to the external box should be entirely submerged to keep it silent.  Otherwise you're going to hear water running around those bulkheads.  I think most manufacturers don't put those bulkheads connecting internal to external low enough in comparison to the internal weir and external box height. It looks like YHSublime handles that by keeping the height in his external box pretty high.  It's fine to do that because of the redundancy in drain pipes.

 

[YHSublime]

2 hours ago, AlanM said:

It looks like YHSublime handles that by keeping the height in his external box pretty high.  It's fine to do that because of the redundancy in drain pipes.

 

I actually snapped that right after I had done a water change, it does run pretty high, but usually it's trickling down the standpipe (red and pictured,) in this instance, it was way above, and was "gulping" every couple of seconds. I've recently plumbed in a new sump, and found a frag plug in my plumbing when I did so, lol. The Aquabox Sump also has a drain box that overflows into a filter sock compartment, so now the loudest thing in the room is the air pulling on the skimmer. 

[mattm]

Thanks for the feedback all. I think the general consensus is run the external box. I’ve probably known this answer for awhile but just been fighting it. Any other option is just over complicating which is the opposite of what I want for this tank.

One more small project to complete at the house and I can finally get this thing on order!

[AlanM]

careful with drilling.  Take your time and go slow.

[nanolong]

On 4/10/2021 at 10:27 AM, YHSublime said:

Got it, function following form, or form following function.

What you’re seeing on scorcheds tank is small, you’re talking about 30+ gallons more. Wheresthereef had some good ideas about what u think you’re trying to do?

I’d personally reconsider the external overflow box. As you can see in my photo, I personally don’t believe it would be any more intrusive if you’re going to run piping down the side. The box pictured on my tank would also work on your side tank.

Another alternative is to not drill at all. You could get a HOB skimmer.

I know these are not options you’re considering, but it’s the safest way with the least amount of risk, imo.

I tried to incorporate Scorched's tank idea and agree that it is risky business. I'll probably run YHSublime's tank model when I upgrade to the Mr Aqua tank down the road.