Any tips appreciated
Well, there’s a lot to it… I’ve spent several hours around here typing out the nuances, but here are some key points:
Lay the tank on its side so you’re drilling straight down from the outside; you use little to no drill feed pressure, letting gravity do most of the work! (Also, you’re cutting wet so a flat surface is easier to keep water on!)
— use a hole saw guide, a piece of rigid material with a hole equal in diameter to the diamond hole saw… this is clamped in place on the tank to keep the diamond hole saw from wandering from the exact spot you want it to start grinding a hole!
— use water liberally, I like to just set up outside and run a garden hose at a trickle across my work area to cool the glass and hole saw as I grind through… the running water also works well to evacuate the glass slurry from the cut!
— use your drill’s clutch! That is, most modern drills have a ring around the drill body up by the chuck with numbers on it, some also have symbols on a second ring (you want the screw symbol selected if applicable)… the numbers on the ring correspond to foot pounds of torque before clutch slip… I like to start around 5-7lbs on the clutch, and bump up to 10-12lbs max as the cut continues! (This clutch system is designed to make the drill head stop spinning, even if the motor is spinning… the clutch slips at your preset torque if you bind up the hole saw inside the glass, preventing you from breaking said glass!)
— this will likely take at least 10mins per-hole, you’re mechanically grinding through glass in a circle; like a fancy piece of sandpaper spinning very fast! I know I spent over 45 mins on my first hole in 1/2” glass… be patient, and don’t get cocky after you complete the first hole successfully!
— set up a bin or a bucket of water directly underneath your target hole location; when you finish your glass hole and the hole saw finally pierces through the inner glass face, a round “slug” of glass will fall out of the center of the hole saw! The container of water is there to catch this glass slug before it breaks your tank!
Sorry, bad wording on my part. I meant like is there anything that says I should put the returns closer to the middle (like at 34 n 40, or something of the like) or is it better to put the return pipes closer to the drains/ the corners?
Ah! There’s no reason you can’t do that, as long as you do keep the holes around 6” apart! (Synergy reef certainly pulls it off with the ~2.5” pair of holes for the shadow overflow!)
Return placement is personal preference! Wherever they go, I recommend investing in quality bulkheads!
— you’re stuck with the hole diameters you have in the bottom pane, but you can make the return holes any size…
— I’m very partial to Hayward BFAS series bulkheads, personally! They require a larger hole diameter than standard bulkheads for equivalently plumbing size, but are substantially better made than any other option I’ve used so-far! (Get them in 3/4” NPT [threaded], as cemented socket bulkheads are one-time use!)
