Quote:
Originally Posted by sphelps
Just to note, if your new tank has two separate overflows you'll need to tee the primary drains into a single gate valve for control. While the overall water flow rate will be constant the flow rate to each overflow will vary, especially with any kind of wave, so if you use two separate gate valves you will be constantly fighting to tune them properly.
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gack! Have you done this yourself? This is exactly how I had my tank set up and it was a constant never ending nightmare. I finally converted back to a durso with all the micro bubbles, noise, and salt creep that I hate because I couldn't deal with the herbies anymore. The levels in my overflow boxes would randomly drift over the course of the day, sometimes with one emptying half way creating a splashing water fall, while the other would fill completely. This was true whether I set the levels with a single gate valve downstream of where they connected, or two gate valves upstream of where they connected. It was the most unstable overflow system I've ever seen. Further to that, I'm not sure if this is a Herbie issue or them being plumbed together, but they were INCREDIBLY sensitive to water level changes in the return chamber of the sump. If I had it throttled just the teeny tiniest bit too much, the return chamber level would fall, and my ATO would kick in (it's a powerful pump that moves a ton of water as it comes from the basement). Then the level would reset below the ATO sensor, causing the ATO to fill the return chamber again. This happened very slowly over the course of 3 days once until suddenly water started pouring down my emergency drain and the SG of my tank had fallen to 1.022
I'd never in a million years run a Herbie with dual overflows plumbed in to a single outlet again. Maybe it's just me and I'm a dolt and set it up wrong and you've had a different experience, but that was easily the biggest error I feel I made with this tank.