[Airmotive]

As I write this, I am sitting in my living room listening to the muffled roar that is my overflow for my 180 gallon tank. I am considering putting a stand-pipe in the overflow so that the water only falls five or six inches instead of the 30" drop it now makes. Which lead me to consider filling the overflow with live rock rubble (since the overflow will now have 24" of water in it). I would drill a couple small holes near the bottom of the stand-pipe to ensure O2 circulation to the lower sections of the overflow.

Okay you salty reefers out there...what's wrong with this idea? What am I forgetting? Why is this not common practice?

Fire away...
JJ

[Reefland]

A standpipe in each overflow will definitely cure the noise problem.

As for adding liverock to the overflows, you could but in a 180 gallon tank, I don't see any advantage. As for adding anything other than rock (i.e. macro algae) is you would then be taking a risk of the standpipe capacity being reduced by clogging which can then overflow the tank.

Scott Z.

[Reefer769]

i plan on making a sump later on in the future, and i am planning on getting the cpr overflow, does this one make a lot of noise too? and if it does can someone explain to me a little about a standpipe and i would hook one up in an overflow.

[Elmo18]

Originally Posted by Reefer769

i plan on making a sump later on in the future, and i am planning on getting the cpr overflow, does this one make a lot of noise too? and if it does can someone explain to me a little about a standpipe and i would hook one up in an overflow.

HOpe Richard Durso doesn't mind me linking to his page

Here is a definitive guide to overflows, including what parts needed to build and install one. However, again, there are different modifications (i.e. Stockman pipe).

http://www.rl180reef.com/

I, myself, have never dealt with an external hang-on the back overflow, so I won't be of any help , but im sure others have.

- Elmo

[SteveP]

Originally Posted by Elmo18

HOpe Richard Durso doesn't mind me linking to his page

Here is a definitive guide to overflows, including what parts needed to build and install one. However, again, there are different modifications (i.e. Stockman pipe).

http://www.rl180reef.com/

I, myself, have never dealt with an external hang-on the back overflow, so I won't be of any help , but im sure others have.

- Elmo

The standpipe design basically works to eliminate the sucking sound that most overflows have (due to pulling in vast amounts of air with the water.) They also allow you to fine tune the water levels in the overflow box, to minimize the amount of noise generated from the "Niagara Falls" setup of most overflows.

I have a small overflow box on my 75 that I modified to incorporate a basic standpipe and the tank is now almost whisper quiet. In fact, I threw out one of my powerheads because it was noisier than the tank...I just never heard it before . My overflow boxes now only drop about 1/2", reducing the sound tremendously. I am currently working on replacing the flexible corrugated downpipe with a smooth pipe to see if that will reduce the sound still further.

The standpipes are relatively easy to make, as long as you keep the basic concept of the water inlet being BELOW the water line in the overflow, acheived by the inverted-J shape of the standpipe. Fitting them into the overflow box itself can be more of a challenge depending on how the box itself is laid out. I think my modification cost me less than $10 in the end.

If I remember, I'll snap a photo of my overflow for you later tonight.

Steve

[acropora]

Although tempting, I would avoid adding anything in the overflow boxes. Especially algae which will eventually clog the intake. The durso standpipe is an excellent choice. Keep in mind you do not have to glue any of the PVC parts. This will make it easy to disassemble to clean.An important note is to add plastic eggcrate into the opening of the durso.This will keep snails and hermits from getting in there. I learned this the hard way when a snail went in the pipe and closed off the return.