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blange3's 180 upgrade

Thanks Jim,

I had just picked up the BeanAnimal scent before my last meeting. As I get a chance between the meaningless job stuff, I'll do a serious search.

Vents? I ain't got no stinking vents!! :eek:
 
Bill, why not change the dursos into a stockman style? To reduce the gurgling of my dursos when I had them prior in the former tank, increasing the vent hole and placing a piece of 20 inch tubing helped with the gurgling and adjustments. Ball valve no good in durso for control, will make flood.
 

Brian

Officer Emeritus
Officer Emeritus
You could also just do a plain 'ole standpipe. After playing with Dursos and Stockmans I finally just took all the extra stuff off and went with a straight pipe...took away all my gurgling and "swooshing".
 
Bill, if you don't remember my stockman re-creation/re-modification, here's some pics from my old thread on RC:

Finished stockman:
pipe.jpg


Main return down flow pipe without the cap:
pipe1.jpg


The cap:
pipe3.jpg



The components:
pipe2.jpg



The breakdown:
pipe4.jpg


The comparison (durso is on the right- pain in the butt to remove when in need of service since the 90 degree bend takes up a lot of room)
pipe5.jpg



In use-
pipe6.jpg





HTH
 
The Stockman stand pipe is basically the same thing as a plain old standpipe but IMO prevents blockage (if you're not using the foam that does around it) since the cap acts as some kind of pre-filter and the hole on the top allows you to regulate airflow to compensate for any gurgling/swooshing. I've never had to adjust mine though. It sits just the way it is. The components are breakable to allow facilitation of cleaning like um... lol. I think I've cleaned it out (last week) once since I started the tank in Jan 06
 
Thanks guy's!

Thanks Merv for the pix.

Of course I have a little twist. I just have bulkheads, no overflow box. I'm trying to get away with plumbing mods only, no drilling or glueing.

I have some more time to play before I take it down for the carpet. The most radical plan being considered is cutting out the existinf plumbing and adding an external durso modeled on BeanAnimals thread.

I could also cut back flow, but I didn't want to go below the current 300gph.
 
Counting down!

Painting - Done!

Entrance tile - Installer is coming 11/7

Carpeting - Installer is coming 11/12

Water on floor in tank: 11/14!

In the meantime I will wire the lights, cust some pond liner and work on silencing the overflows.

I can also do some molding work we were going to do later.

Hey Mike, what's a good place to get some custom 1" by somethings made?
 

mikem

Officer Emeritus
Officer Emeritus
Bill. I can make you custom molding, or I can lend you the tools to do it. Need an idea of what you're looking for.
 
Thanks Mike!

I need to mold around the entrances into the dining room. I wanted to finish off the header and studs with 1" pine to give a nice edge for the casing molding. However the width of the walls are wider than 1" x 4" and less than 1" x 6", so I guess I have to rip 1" x 6"'s to size. I don't have the tools for it so I thought the easiest thing to do is order it from a lumber yard.

I loved the trimwork on your tank which made me realize you must be a molding wizard! ;D
 
paintman27 said:
Can the Site Admin. please rename this thread blange3's 180 month uprgeade please? ??? ??? ??? ;D

Well, if I could have afforded the services of a highly skilled paintman, this would have been a done deal by now. ;D

So what is going on with Bill's upgrade?

My dream was to spend the quiet evenings during the holdays sitting in front of my new tank with a nice drink and a roaring fire.

As of today the new carpet is installed and the new furniture will be delivered Wednesday. I need wood for the fireplace and the liquor cabinet needs some restocking.

The tank? Oh yeah. 8)

It's back in the living room on top of a carpet protector, levelled, filled with saltwater, float switch for overflow protection installed, flood alarms in place and overflows tuned to be very, very quiet.

Tank is running a little cool so I have to upgrade the heaters. Hopefully sand will get washed tonight and added to the tank. (I love to listen to the screams of the bare bottom people!) About 100lbs of cooked rock to move on Tuesday and then I'll wire the lights.

I have some fish in QT that are ready to go, so when the parameters say go they'll move in so I can start QT'ing the last acqusitions which should be 2 TBD tangs. (I wonder how many people will search live aquaria for TBD tangs?)
 

magic

Officer Emeritus
Officer Emeritus
I have some fish in QT that are ready to go, so when the parameters say go they'll move in so I can start QT'ing the last acqusitions which should be 2 TBD tangs. (I wonder how many people will search live aquaria for TBD tangs?)

Their from the Red Sea right? Very hard to get! :)
 
Oooooo sounds close. How did you "tune" the overflows that is my one real issue that I have not solved yet. Pictures when you have time would be great. ;)

I think I saw those tangs at AO.
 
JRWOHLER said:
Oooooo sounds close. How did you "tune" the overflows that is my one real issue that I have not solved yet. Pictures when you have time would be great. ;)

I was thinking about adding to the first post today, "And I ain't got no stinking pictures!" ;D Maybe tommorrow. ;)

My overflow options are constrained by a few things.

1) The tank is not a standard reef ready, it has 2 1" holes with bulkheads; one in each upper back corner.
2) For various reasons I did not want to drill anything new or add overflow boxes. An external overflow would not have been acceptable to the interior decorator police.
3) The water level with only strainers in the bulkheads was way too low to look good.


So: After reading the popular RC thread by Beananimal on silent overflows, this is what I have settled on.

One overflow has a 1" elbow and strainer turned downward so the intake is well below the water level. The return line has a ball valve to control flow. I let this line start a siphon and then adjust it so it can't quite keep up with the return pump.

The other overflow has a 1" elbow and strainer turned upward to raise the waterlevel to an acceptable height. The first overflow is adjusted so that a very small amount of water needs to go through the second overflow, which it does with a slight sound.

Beananimal on the RC thread insists that you need a third overflow for safety with this method, but I didn't want to drill another hole, so I added an autotopoff.com float switch to shut the return pump down if the level goes too high. And just in case I have two water alarms on the carpet behind the tank.

I now appreciate why folks prefer gate valves for fine adjustments, but the tank came with the returns already plumbed with gate valves. When the tank is well established and I run out of things to do, maybe I'll replace the valves. ;D
 
blange3 said:
An external overflow would not have been acceptable to the interior decorator police.

I can appreciate that. For me the line was drawn when I asked for a 6 foot long tank.
:p
 
blange3 said:
paintman27 said:
Can the Site Admin. please rename this thread blange3's 180 month uprgeade please? ??? ??? ??? ;D


Tank is running a little cool so I have to upgrade the heaters. Hopefully sand will get washed tonight and added to the tank. (I love to listen to the screams of the bare bottom people!) About 100lbs of cooked rock to move on Tuesday and then I'll wire the lights.

I have some fish in QT that are ready to go, so when the parameters say go they'll move in so I can start QT'ing the last acqusitions which should be 2 TBD tangs. (I wonder how many people will search live aquaria for TBD tangs?)

Something told me to check this thread. I heard gritty noises.... aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaahhhhh

I DID NOT check live aquaria. I google'd it :D
 
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