Overflow Setup for New Tank

[Itchy Trigger]

Going to be setting up a 96"x46"x30" tank soon. This will be a peninsula-style tank with an overflow on one end. I was planning to have six 1.5" drains in the overflow box... Would two "Bean Animal" setups work in the same box? Two main drains, two Dursos and two emergency drains? Or would there be issues with that?

 

[TaylorPilot]

How much flow are you wanting to put thru it...2 complete settings isnt ideal...youd be doing better to run a single set worth 2" drains, but you better wanna flow a bunch of water...

 

[malacoda]

I think two would be a lot of overkill ... not to mention they'd probably be incredibly difficult to get dialed in and kept in sync with each other.

Not saying it can't be done.

But, to give you an idea of how much overkill it might end up being...

I just setup a 60x30x24 peninsula with an external overflow box, a normal 3-pipe BeanAnimal with 1.5" pipes, and 1" return that gets choked down to 3/4" at the return bulkheads (so that I could fit Loc-line nozzles on them inside the DT)...

I'm turning over about 1300 gallons per hour through the sump — or ~6X tank volume turnover per hour.

Most tanks these days typically run 5-7X turnover. (Some even less.)

At that amount of turnover, with 1.5" drain pipes, the gate valve on my main drain is only open about 15%.

And I'm getting plenty of draw through the OF box. Enough to easily skim DT surface clean of any film/organics that rise to the water surface.

In other words, the 1.5" pipes give the capacity to open up the gate valve much, much more, install a bigger return pump, and push way more hourly turnover...

But I'd be flowing so much water into, and through OF, so fast, that it would sound like a raging waterfall ... for no real additional gain in tank performance. Not to mention hinder the performance of any mechanical filtration.)

There's so much spare capacity with a well-sized standard BeanAnimal, I can't imagine the need for two of them.

 

[Itchy Trigger]

Thank you both for the replies. So it sounds like I might be ok with a single set of three 1.5" drains?

 

[UncommonSense]

I was planning to have six 1.5" drains in the overflow box...

One 2” drain can move around 3,300GPH in full siphon, which is just shy of 7x turnovers per-hour on a tank this size!

(Or, 2.5-3” if you can find the plumbing parts! — basically, just scale up a traditional BeanAnimal drain system to get the throughput you want!)

 

[Itchy Trigger]

I guess a set of three 2" drains would be the best option then, with the only drawback being the higher price of 2" pvc fittings, etc.

 

[KrisReef]

The outside diameter of the bulkhead fittings is going to greatly increase the size of the overflow box (footprint) as you go from 1.5 up to 2.0 inch pipes.

The return pipes , are you going to put them inside the same box or?

That is a really nice tank size!

 

[UncommonSense]

The outside diameter of the bulkhead fittings is going to greatly increase the size of the overflow box (footprint) as you go from 1.5 up to 2.0 inch pipes.

Excellent point!

In a case where space is at a premium, two 1.5” bulkheads would definitely serve well for the siphon channel if wyed together into a single 2”-2.5” pipe/gate valve!

Something like this:

The open (aka secondary) and emergency drain channels would also need a pair of 1.5” bulkheads each… but, each pair would not need to be wyed together like the siphon (aka primary) drain!

 

[Itchy Trigger]

Excellent point!

In a case where space is at a premium, two 1.5” bulkheads would definitely serve well for the siphon channel if wyed together into a single 2”-2.5” pipe/gate valve!

Something like this:

The open (aka secondary) and emergency drain channels would also need a pair of 1.5” bulkheads each… but, each pair would not need to be wyed together like the siphon (aka primary) drain!

Interesting - thank you. So, just to be sure I understand, in this scenario there would be six 1.5" bulkheads in the overflow box - two would be full siphon and wyed together to 2" pipe under the tank as you describe, two would be durso-style standpipes and two would be emergency drains?

I would then have the sump fitted with four 1.5" bulkheads for the secondary and emergency drain pairs and one 2" bulkhead for the combined full siphon drains?

 

[UncommonSense]

Interesting - thank you. So, just to be sure I understand, in this scenario there would be six 1.5" bulkheads in the overflow box - two would be full siphon and wyed together to 2" pipe under the tank as you describe, two would be durso-style standpipes and two would be emergency drains?

I would then have the sump fitted with four 1.5" bulkheads for the secondary and emergency drain pairs and one 2" bulkhead for the combined full siphon drains?

You are correct! The two main drains are combined into a single 2” for ease of siphon tuning, then everything else is left to dump into the sump with minimal restrictions!

Though, the duroso standpipes are not necessary on secondary drains! - they can typically just be a regular standpipe, or a standpipe with two 90 elbows at the top!

 

[Itchy Trigger]

Reviving this thread from 7 months ago...

I finally got the 96"x46"x30" tank built and delivered, and it's beautiful. External overflow with three 2" drains for a 2" Bean Animal... But the guy who made the tank and sump made a mistake - 2" bulkheads in the external overflow, but 1.5" bulkheads on the sump.

So I obviously could just reduce the 2" to 1.5" at the sump and go with that, but in this scenario I'm just not getting what I paid for. My plan was to use a pair of VarioS 10 pumps on this tank, which each push about 4000 gph. I haven't bought them yet, but any feedback would be appreciated. Maybe I don't need that much flow?

If a single 1.5" Bean Animal would be sufficient for a tank this size, which return pumps would you folks recommend using?

 

[UncommonSense]

If a single 1.5" Bean Animal would be sufficient for a tank this size

You can probably get ~2,500GPH out of 1.5” on the higher end… so ~5x turnovers per-hour… with two pumps? Something in the 1,800GPH-ish range would work well!

However,

but 1.5" bulkheads on the sump.

Is the sump acrylic? If so, is there enough surrounding material to have a local plastic fab shop enlarge the sump holes to accommodate 2” bulkheads? (Likely at the builder’s dime…)

If glass, or if you don’t want to get into the rabbit hole that is changing a prebuilt sump/warranty work, why not just remove the sump bulkheads and stick the 2” pipe straight through the bulkhead holes?

 

[Itchy Trigger]

why not just remove the sump bulkheads and stick the 2” pipe straight through the bulkhead holes?

THIS is likely what I'll do!