Herbie vs BeanAnimal overflow method?

[Chris-tico]

im not sure dude. im totally new with this.

correct me if im wrong... is the overflow says that it is 800gph.. my return pump shoud me 800gph too?

or the return pump should have more or less GPH than the 800GPH of the overflow

 

[TheEngineer]

OK, you want to know if the flow-rate of the overflow is high enough to match your pump. Well.... we don't know unless you tell us more. What pump are you using, how many feet of rise does it have to pump up, how many elbows are in your plumbing?

You ideally want your overflow to be able to handle 50% more than your pump is putting out, but you just need to be less than it. If your pump is putting 801gph into your tank and your overflow can only take out 800gph, you will have 1 gallon of water on your floor every hour.

 

[Trex]

I have a 210 and am interested in running a herbie. Are you running the Herbie on the left and right overflows? How do you have your sump set up? Mine has the filter socks on the left side of sump. Will the Herbie on right side of tank still be efficient with the six foot run under the tank to the left side of the sump?

I have a separate Herbie in each overflow -- and they are separate all the way to the sump.

My sump too has the filter socks on the left hand side, so the right Herbie is a bit longer. Oddly enough, the right one gets more flow (( thinking the pipe must be a touch lower than the left one )), but not enough to cause any issues. The filter sock for the right one gets dirty faster.
I toed my sump as far right as I could, so the right Herbie has to get maybe 2 feet to get to the filter sock;

Hopefully some pictures will explain it better. Should note, been running since December, and haven't had any issues. Will be taking the tank down shortly (( going to be moving )) and don't plan on changing up the plumping at all.

Top down. E-drains are the outside ones.

Ignore the EB8 -- was just seeing the size. Lower gate valve is for the return.

Have since lengthened the E-drain to right above the water line.

The left E-drain (( again lengthened ))

Into the socks.

 

[SuperSaiyanTang]

Instead of creating a new thread this seemed like a good place to ask the question..

I have a 48x28x24 tank. Three 1 3/4 drains, One 1 3/4 return. Plan to use 1'' bulkheads

The bean animal seems like it takes alot of pieces to throw together. What about using a herbie with 3 drains? Two full siphon and One emergency?

 

[TheEngineer]

Instead of creating a new thread this seemed like a good place to ask the question..

I have a 48x28x24 tank. Three 1 3/4 drains, One 1 3/4 return. Plan to use 1'' bulkheads

The bean animal seems like it takes alot of pieces to throw together. What about using a herbie with 3 drains? Two full siphon and One emergency?

2x 3/4" drains all running at full siphon will pull down somewhere around 4500gph (give or take). That's a heck of a lot of flow for a 120g. You'd have to turn them both way down. I suppose you'd get some extra redundancy out of it. You could tune it like a bean animal at that point, I'd think.

 

[Chris-tico]

OK, you want to know if the flow-rate of the overflow is high enough to match your pump. Well.... we don't know unless you tell us more. What pump are you using, how many feet of rise does it have to pump up, how many elbows are in your plumbing?

You ideally want your overflow to be able to handle 50% more than your pump is putting out, but you just need to be less than it. If your pump is putting 801gph into your tank and your overflow can only take out 800gph, you will have 1 gallon of water on your floor every hour.

im going with the Jebao DCT-6000 pump (i can get any suggestion).... i dont know about how many feet of rise or elbows. (i only have the skimmer haha)

so i think its better to have an overflow that can handle more GPH. than the pump?

 

[mtfish]

OK, you want to know if the flow-rate of the overflow is high enough to match your pump. Well.... we don't know unless you tell us more. What pump are you using, how many feet of rise does it have to pump up, how many elbows are in your plumbing?

You ideally want your overflow to be able to handle 50% more than your pump is putting out, but you just need to be less than it. If your pump is putting 801gph into your tank and your overflow can only take out 800gph, you will have 1 gallon of water on your floor every hour.

Although not optimal and would be a waste of energy, you can always put a valve on the return flow to regulate GPH to match the capacity of your overflow. It would be the same as adding head pressure to the pump.

 

[TheEngineer]

im going with the Jebao DCT-6000 pump (i can get any suggestion).... i dont know about how many feet of rise or elbows. (i only have the skimmer haha)

so i think its better to have an overflow that can handle more GPH. than the pump?

OK, so you are going to use a DC pump. That makes this a lot easier. You can then dial down the flow on the pump to get what you need. That pump runs 1585GPH max (that's right at the outlet). Assume your rise is around 3' (distance from the pump to where it goes back in the tank), you'll be down around 1000gph max (according to the manufacturer) and if we ignore all other sources of loss like your plumbing. So you have an extra 200gph of wiggle room from your pump vs the overflow. To me, I think that's a decent match, but only if you know that pump won't ever start putting out more than your overflow can handle (greater than 800gph).

 

[TheEngineer]

I should add, my guess is that the limitation on this overflow is not the plumbing, but the grating that allows water into the box itself. So if the flow gets to fast, it will likely go over the top of it. If the top is lower than the lip of your tank then you are fine. If it is at the same height, you get a flood.

 

[Chris-tico]

I should add, my guess is that the limitation on this overflow is not the plumbing, but the grating that allows water into the box itself. So if the flow gets to fast, it will likely go over the top of it. If the top is lower than the lip of your tank then you are fine. If it is at the same height, you get a flood.

thanks that a really good thing to know.. to install the overflow lower than the lip, to avoid any flood.!

with what you have said, i think that the 800GPH overflow its ok..

but what if i go with one that is 1200GPH? its going to be even better??

 

[TheEngineer]

thanks that a really good thing to know.. to install the overflow lower than the lip, to avoid any flood.!

with what you have said, i think that the 800GPH overflow its ok..

but what if i go with one that is 1200GPH? its going to be even better??

You can email the person who makes it and ask what is causing the limitation. I'm pretty confident it is the linear-inches of overflow in the tank. You're going to tune the valves on the overflow to set whatever your actual flow-rate is. Assuming that's the case, I personally would go with the higher flow-rate box to be safe. Otherwise you are starting off behind the 8-ball.

 

[TaylorPilot]

@icecool2 is right on. One thing to add is what is the height difference between the bottom of the teeth and the rim of your tank. If you install it too low, the water line will show. I would be leery about running a system at its limit. Because even if it is capable of flowing say 800 gph, that may be in a perfect world before a weeks worth of algae fills the teeth, or before a 4" piece of nori breaks loose or a fish dies and sticks to it and covers 20-30% of the teeth in your overflow. You just need to be sure that the water level when running will rise enough to ensure that the water level is above the rim. Also, running a system at its limit will usually mean that the water level will rise allot, sometimes up to an inch, depending on the water flow and weir length. That means that you have to have a sump capable of holding that much more water during pump maintenance, or a power outage. This all sounds complicated, but it isn't that bad. Ideally, I would get an overflow that is about 6" to 1' shorter than your tank, then get a pump that is a little bigger than you think you would want, then turn it down to better match your weir. You can always throttle down a pump, but you can't make it pump more than it is rated for. HTH

 

[Chris-tico]

Hey guys i cant really say how grateful am i for all your help! im totally new about overflows pumps and stuff.! so this have helpme alot!

@icecool2 I would get an overflow that is about 6" to 1' shorter than your tank

Taylor, with this do you mean: to install the top of the overflow 6" - 1' below the rim of the tank??

 

[TaylorPilot]

I mean that if you have a 3' long tank, I would look for a 2' long overflow. That will give you 6 inches on either side so that you can get a magnet or cleaning pad in there to easily clean the side glass. Like my tank is a 48" 120, so I would like to have about a 36" long overflow box. The longer the box, the better the surface skimming you will get. In fact, when they are long like that, usually they skim so good that you have to either get a feeding ring or turn off the return pump when you feed, cause it will just suck the food right down the overflow. How long is your tank going to be and what size overflows does that company make?

 

[Chris-tico]

oh ok.. my tank is going to be 1meter long.. aprox 39 inches... the overflow its 8" (- Dimensions: inside box- 8" x 1.5" x 5" tall)

 

[TaylorPilot]

yea, I would look into the next size up. 8 inches is pretty short. Especially with teeth. It effectively turns it into a 4" weir.

 

[TheEngineer]

Hey guys i cant really say how grateful am i for all your help! im totally new about overflows pumps and stuff.! so this have helpme alot!

That's what the community is for We all started from the same place.

 

[Eckolancer]

Bean animal is quiet enough for wife approval and has a fail safe from leaking. I have had the emergency drain used a couple times in the past two years as a snail climbed in the main drain. My fridge is louder then the tank and is about 20 feet away from where I sit. Here is a pic of the drain.

 

[Eckolancer]

One more thing if I could redo my tank I would put the overflow box on the outside. My reason for this is the box takes up space inside the tank and if it was outside it would not take up any extra space as plumbing is already there.

 

[joseg]

Anybody can help me and pass me a DIY Herbie tutorial or videotutorial? (for dummies, lol)

Thanks mates.