New Drain Design

[superduperwesman]

So I like the type of drain design that greenspottedpuffer did on his tank

http://i144.photobucket.com/albums/r179/Justinpsmith/DSCN2447.jpg

http://i144.photobucket.com/albums/r179/Justinpsmith/DSCN2462.jpg

http://i144.photobucket.com/albums/r179/Justinpsmith/Pics139.jpg

But I would want to make sure that it was still ultra quite. So I was thinking I might try something like this on my next tank.

http://i103.photobucket.com/albums/m141/superduperwesman/NewDrain.jpg

Thoughts? Comments? Basically it's just a mix of the slot tube with a herbie. The tube with the slot is your "overflow" and the larger pipe is your backup drain. It might not be something super practical for a larger tank because of the size of outer tube you need to house the inner tube but I mainly stick to small tanks so I think it would work? This would allow you to have a sleak hidden "overflow" along the top edge of your tank (like greenspottedpuffer's above^) while maintaining a quite drain with only one bulkhead. I just hate how much room overflows can take up, especially in a small tank, and especially if you want to run a herbi. This would only be one tube along the top and one down and out.

My only concern would be that the inner tube could rattle with the outer tube but I'm sure if you sized them accordingly and weren't going to far to the sump it would be ok.

*Edit: Obivously you might have to get a bit creative with some of the plumbing (fitting in fitting) but nothing to crazy.

[mark]

could work, like you said playing around and trimming fittings to get things to fit and adjust for height. Wouldn't worry about rattling as could easily brace with spacers. Tightest part probably the getting the inner elbow to fit.

Here's some idea of pipe size, 1", 1.5", and 2" thin walled conduit.
http://i67.photobucket.com/albums/h316/das75/PC190018.jpg

[superduperwesman]

could work, like you said playing around and trimming fittings to get things to fit and adjust for height. Wouldn't worry about rattling as could easily brace with spacers. Tightest part probably the getting the inner elbow to fit.

Here's some idea of pipe size, 1", 1.5", and 2" thin walled conduit.
http://i67.photobucket.com/albums/h316/das75/PC190018.jpg

Thanks... yeah I think it would work especially considering most of my drains were only 1/2" or 3/4"... so far.

I forgot the tank would still need another bulkhead for the return line unless it just came over the back??

[Doo]

Cool idea! - please update on the progress :)

[untamed]

I think that will work and it is a very inventive idea. You're in for some tricky plumbing up there in that elbow section. You might have to cut an elbow in half, then weld it back together in order to get the small elbow inside it.

[fkshiu]

Interesting idea, although I am having a bit of trouble conceptualizing how you would prevent most of the water from going down the larger emergency drain during normal operation.

If you somehow designed some kind of a weir that directed the water only into the smaller interior drain, there may be some difficulty with tuning since you'd have trouble see how close the interior drain was to being "full". In a standard Herbie this is easy because you can observe the water level in the overflow space. It would be difficult to do the same in your design. You can't even observe which pipe (inside or outside) the water is exiting from in the sump since a truly silent herbie requires the drain pipes to be submerged in the sump.

[StirCrazy]

I used a design like that about 5 years ago as one of my first ones.. didn't like it as it was hard to quiet down even with external durso's and it plugged up with algae causeing me to have to clean it almost every day.

Steve

[Sam1969]

you could use soft tubing for the inner tube, solving the problem of fitting in the 90.

[Nate]

Why wouldnt you just drill the two holes if you are still in the concept phase...make for a breeze plumbing it...might not be as cool, but much easier...

[Myka]

Check out Herbie style drains. If you're going to restrict flow with a gate valve, you're best off using a second "safety" drain like the Herbie's do. Interesting idea, but my first concern would be how quickly that would likely plug up, and as Stir Crazy stated, it's a definate likelihood.