Bean animal water level?

[Dave-T]

In the pictures I've seen of the bean animal, the secondary drain opening is well below the base of the overflow weir. Someone told me that with any overflow (including the bean animal) you'll still hear some splashing as the water flows over the weir. Is this true? I'm not getting why the secondary drain opening shouldn't be above the base of the weir, to avoid a waterfall going over the weir.

Thanks!

 

[Snoopy 67]

If the secondary is not too far under splashing can be eliminated.

 

[Dave-T]

Ok... I'm not getting how you control the water level without having a valve on the secondary. Don't you want to make sure the water level is at or above the level of the base of the weir?

 

[Billldg]

The main drain will have a full siphon and be below the water line in the overflow, the secondary will be a half siphon and only be half way below the water line. I have a gate valve on my primary and nothing on me secondary. You control the water level with the gate valve on the primary. Hope this helps.

 

[Dave-T]

The main drain will have a full siphon and be below the water line in the overflow, the secondary will be a half siphon and only be half way below the water line. I have a gate valve on my primary and nothing on me secondary. You control the water level with the gate valve on the primary. Hope this helps.

Ok, well I guess if it works, it works. But I'm not getting why the water level doesn't drop down to the level of the secondary.

 

[Porpoise Hork]

The main drain will have a full siphon and be below the water line in the overflow, the secondary will be a half siphon and only be half way below the water line. I have a gate valve on my primary and nothing on me secondary. You control the water level with the gate valve on the primary. Hope this helps.

Same here with mine. 97-98% of the drain is on the primary drain and it empties just below the waterline in the sump. The secondary usually just has a trickle going to it. The line for it also drains into the filter sock in my sump so most of the time it's silent.

There's a fair bit of adjusting to get the return and drain balanced out but once you get there it's usually just a 16th of a turn on the gate valve open/closed once a week or so to keep the waterline in the overflow in the right place. Every now and then my ATO will not kick on and the pump level chamber will be low and thusly cause the overflow to lower as well causing it to gurgle at the auto syphon hole. Once I fix the ATO and it fills back up to where it's supposed to be the overflow usually fills back up on its own w/o any adjustment to the gate valve needed.

 

[Billldg]

Ok, well I guess if it works, it works. But I'm not getting why the water level doesn't drop down to the level of the secondary.

Is the secondary half way below the water line in the overflow?

When I get home I will take a photo of my overflow box water level.

 

[Dburr1014]

You know, a picture says a 1000 words.

As said, main, half way down in your box and full syphone.
Secondary, just below Weir to avoid splashing noise and slight trickle.
Third, just above 2nd.

 

[Morpheosz]

Ok... I'm not getting how you control the water level without having a valve on the secondary. Don't you want to make sure the water level is at or above the level of the base of the weir?

You use the gate valve on the full siphon to control the water level. You want the water level a bit below the weir otherwise your weir won't do its job of skimming the organic crud that likes to collect on the surface of your tank. Just 1/2" or so is enough to skim the crud but not make any falling / splashing noise. The bean animal that came built into my tank has the secondary 1/2" down, emergency 1/4" down, and full siphon about 1.5" down. So normally you run it with the water about 1/2" down, just up to the top of the secondary drain (again, controlled by cranking down the gate valve on the full siphon).

 

[Dave-T]

Thanks!

 

[Dave-T]

I was just thinking some more about this. Why would you want the weir to skim the surface crud you talked about? Otherwise it will just keep accumulating. Don't you want it to go to the sump so it can get filtered out? Look at this image from BRS. The water level is above the base of the weir. This seems better to me.

 

[Dburr1014]

I was just thinking some more about this. Why would you want the weir to skim the surface crud you talked about? Otherwise it will just keep accumulating. Don't you want it to go to the sump so it can get filtered out? Look at this image from BRS. The water level is above the base of the weir. This seems better to me.

This is a correct picture. It skims the crud on top to the sump to get skimmed out. The drain should be low enough so not to get that cyclone air sucking noise at full syphone. I like to run the second drain just below the weir. The water won't fall to much, maybe 1/2"or so. Less splashing noise.

 

[Dave-T]

Ok, agreed. I was referring to what @Morpheosz said, about having the water level below the base of the weir.

 

[nereefpat]

I was just thinking some more about this. Why would you want the weir to skim the surface crud you talked about? Otherwise it will just keep accumulating. Don't you want it to go to the sump so it can get filtered out? Look at this image from BRS. The water level is above the base of the weir. This seems better to me.

In that picture, I would keep the primary (siphon) where it is, raise the secondary to just below the bottom of the weir, and raise the emergency to the middle of the weir (slots in the overflow).

 

[Dave-T]

In that picture, I would keep the primary (siphon) where it is, raise the secondary to just below the bottom of the weir, and raise the emergency to the middle of the weir (slots in the overflow).

Thanks. So you'd have the water level below the bottom of the weir, like @Morpheosz. That's what I'm trying to understand. Why would you want to do it that way? Stuff floating on the surface would tend to not flow into the overflow. How is that a good thing? Don't you want floating stuff to get filtered out in the sump? And you could still have a little bit of a trickling sound if the water is pouring down into the weir.

 

[nereefpat]

That BRS picture has quite a few things wrong with it, including calling that system a Bean when it isn't. They should probably credit the designer (Bean from RC about 18 years ago), and stick to his design or call it something different. Anyway...

Thanks. So you'd have the water level below the bottom of the weir, like @Morpheosz. That's what I'm trying to understand. Why would you want to do it that way? Stuff floating on the surface would tend to not flow into the overflow. How is that a good thing? Don't you want floating stuff to get filtered out in the sump? And you could still have a little bit of a trickling sound if the water is pouring down into the weir.

The surface in the display will be skimmed as it goes through the teeth. You'll see.

You won't hear a trickling sound from water falling if it's only falling less than an inch.

 

[Dburr1014]

Thanks. So you'd have the water level below the bottom of the weir, like @Morpheosz. That's what I'm trying to understand. Why would you want to do it that way? Stuff floating on the surface would tend to not flow into the overflow. How is that a good thing? Don't you want floating stuff to get filtered out in the sump? And you could still have a little bit of a trickling sound if the water is pouring down into the weir.

I think your miss-understanding.
This picture is inside the overflow box. So yes below the weir. In the tank, above the weir so water flows into the overflow box. So to layer is skimmed in the tank.
Gravity says everything flows down.

 

[Arego]

Mine is at full siphon, primary valve wide open and it's right about even with my durso down spout and a half inch under my emergency.

Your drain size and return plumbing/pump size/speed will play together to determine where that water line will be.

 

[KStatefan]

With the water level in the overflow box like the BRS picture it will make noise. The secondary needs to be moved up so it does not fall that much I have mine set at about 1/2 inch like others have said.

 

[Morpheosz]

Thanks. So you'd have the water level below the bottom of the weir, like @Morpheosz. That's what I'm trying to understand. Why would you want to do it that way? Stuff floating on the surface would tend to not flow into the overflow. How is that a good thing? Don't you want floating stuff to get filtered out in the sump? And you could still have a little bit of a trickling sound if the water is pouring down into the weir.

I'm not sure where the confusion is - you seem to be saying it both ways - you say "why would you want to do it that way" with the water below the weir, then you say "don't you want the floating stuff to get filtered into the sump. That's exactly what we are saying - to skim the surface crud, the water has to be below the weir, otherwise the surface crud will not get skimmed out. Point being that once surface crud goes through the weir, it falls a bit so it is out of the tank and can't get back in. If the water in the overflow is at tank height, the surface crud will just stay on the surface and never get removed. As @Dburr1014 mentioned, mine is only 1/2" or so below and there is no trickling sound. If my water level drops to more than an inch, it does start making sound.