with a diamond tip blade you can cut just about anything with anything:):)

ok if that eurobrace to easy. it will just go along the top. so you make your overflow notch a little deeper as you will want the water below the euor brace anyways.

I would get sea star to make the notch while it is there. they have the tools to do it fast and if they have the tank apart while they do it then all the easier. they can just use there belt sander with silicon carbide abrasive and it will cut it in no time. they might even have a better tool to do it also. just ask them about it to find out. so I would make your notch 1.25" deep and say 12" long. if your using 1/2" for the euro brace this will give you a water level about 1/2" below the euro brace.

drilling your external overflow bottom for the bulkheads will be a lot simpler and allow for even neater plumbing than drilling the back of the tank, also reducing the space you need to leave behind the tank. as the overflow just has to be barly bigger than the dia of the bulkheads. if you go out the back of the tank you need your bulkhead thread or slip lenght, then the lenght of the 90 or "T" and space to install them. I would preinstall the bulkheads into the overflow bottom then assemble the overflow, the pipes inside the overflow can just be friction fit with slip and you will have enough room under to work what you want. this also allows your two or 3 pipes to run strait down into the stand for a very clean look with out a bunch of 90's and such.

how much flow are you planning on running through the sump from the tank? this will decide the bulkhead size for the herbie, remember under full syphon the pipe will flow more than if just gravity fed with air also. so you would have to see what people running herbies are using for bulkhead sizes and what there return pump is so you can figure out what you need.

Steve

I used a dremmel on mine after I notched it with a glass cutter to even it out. you need the expensive diamond bits and you need the extender whip that lets you use it like a pen grinder as you need to have water running on the glass constantly to prevent it from getting hot.

Brad, I was just thinking.. where exactly in the house are you putting this?

Steve

Steve, Seastar won't cut a notch, only drill holes. And I don't need to take the tank apart, just reseal the corners.

Drains will likely be 1" pipes for the herbie, I'll be running maybe 1000gph, probably less.

Tank is going in the living room, against the wall backing onto the kitchen. Or it's going into the bathroom of the suite, depends on weight :)

if you want to see the noise level on a "beananimal" overflow i am getting a tank this weekend with it. you are free to come and see if the noise level ease of setting it up would be worth it for you.

Jon, I'll take you up on that. PM with your info and we'll talk!

Hey Jon and Brad.

Just for clarification: Jon's tank doesn't have a full-on Bean Animal overflow. I disconnected the piece of tubing from one of the stand pipes and eventually removed one of the elbows effectively turning it into a Herbie with two fail-safes because it was more hassle than it was worth. I did that about 5 months ago when we moved into our new place after living with a fussy BeanAnimal overflow for a year. I find it's less finicky this way.

As far as notching goes, SeaStar won't cut a notch but they will build the tank with a notch. The back of my old tank (now Jon's) is notched but they built it by siliconing two smaller pieces on either side of the shortened back pane of glass (this is concealed by the piece of acrylic glued to the inside of the back pane of glass). So one option, albeit likely expensive, is to have them rebuild the back pane of glass.

Thanks for clarifying. either way you designed that thing to be silent. Thanks again Andrew

Andrew, I don't think I want to tank the tank apart and replace panels, so worst case, I'll drill the back and use an internal overflow box using some sort of herbie/beananimal design.
What are you running now? Upgrading ?

Bowing out to spend more time golfing and generally being more active. I want to play competitively next year (more than anything for the fun of it) and need to put the time in to getting my handicap down to a scratch.