40gal Humble Reef

[wpeterson]

How do you like the Eshopps Eclipse overflow? Is it really quiet? I bought one for a tank and I'm concerned that it may be too noisy so I haven't drilled the tank yet. Glad to have found your build so I can actually ask someone who's using one. What's your experience with the noise level? Can you also tell me how high up the water is above the bottom of the teeths so I can judge how high to install the overflow and What is the size of your return pump in gallons/hr. There is very little reviews on this overflow. Thx

I've been happy with the overflow and I would buy it again for this sized tank up to maybe 90gals. At >= 100gal I would upgrade to a larger eshopps eclipse (3x 1" drains w/ 2x 1.5" internal bulkheads for a bean animal style).

The build quality is excellent and it's well designed. I run a Herbie style drain with 1" tuned siphon and 1" open standpipe emergency drain. It's almost completely quiet.

My only gripe is the 1.5" main bulkhead - this should probably be a 1" bulkhead instead, unless you run really high flow. When you run low volume through the overflow, the internal overflow fills without splashing, but the external portion may not be filled to capacity which causes splashing/gurgling at the 1.5" overflow transition point.

I've worked around this easily enough by restricting the flow using a smaller diameter insert in the 1.5" overflow and a 45" elbow to help redirect flow away from my open siphon drain to prevent air being subsumed directly (elbow redirects to the other side of the drain, where it swirls around the emergency standpipe vs. around the open bulkhead for the siphon, which can create turbulence/vortex and suck air more easily).

When you're plumbing it, as always with hard-plumbing you want to ensure your lines are straight and there is no lateral pressure on the overflow drain bulkheads. One of the other folks in my local club with this overflow had trouble getting his bulkheads to seal cleanly because his plumbing from the drains had a slight angle to it, which prevented a clean seal. With a more traditional in-tank overflow, you're working with wholes in the glass which may present a more firm target.

So, overall would do it again and I recommend it. My nitpicks and work-arounds detailed above.

I re-plumbed the overflow/drains using all hard-PVC to increase flow, durability, and introduce more PVC unions to allow disassembly/maintenance. Note, 1" unions added just below drain bulkheads and just above drain holes in sump. I used 90 deg elbows because 45 degree plumbing wouldn't fit in the small lateral space to do a 180 deg transition from back drain to sump under display.

I switched to a simple ball-valve for full-siphon control from a gate-valve, but mostly due to time pressure and lack of parts. Gate valve strongly recommended for fine-tuning of your siphon to get it totally silent, though I've made due with the ball-valve just fine.

I also dropped to a single hard-plumbed 3/4" return line/nozzle instead of two, but with the extra flow of hard plumbing vs. flexible tubing it's more than enough:

 

[wpeterson]

It's hard to tell from the empty tank photo above, but I left about 1/2" gap between the top of the internal overflow and tank brace. I was worried when I drilled it that I'd measure too close and have pressure on the overflow if I didn't leave room. I now wish I'd mounted/drilled it flush with the top of the tank/braces. Your mileage may vary, but I would do that differently knowing what I know now. This results in about a 1/4" visible gap between water line and tank bracing for me.

Here's a full tank shot of things as they stand today, with a low amount of flow from my big Jebao DCS-12000 (40%) and the siphon drain at about 50% adjusted by ball valve:

The water height in the display is to about 1/4" from the top of the internal overflow weir, but this is partly adjusted for my lower amount of flow here by restricting the 1.5" main bulkhead using an insert (so more back-pressure on display side leads to higher water level here - mostly for anti-splashing/noise reduction vs. esthetics).

For proper surface skimming I'd shoot for a normal water level right in the middle of the weir teeth. For me this means 0-1/4" gap from top of internal overflow to top of internal display bracing. Your mileage may vary.

Please forgive lack of fish/sad corals in this shot - tank was dark and I turned lights on briefly to take this picture.

 

[reefsahoy]

Thanks for the info. I'll be installing mine on a rimless tank so I don't have to worry too much about where the water level is other than I hate to use a magnet and water spills over the rim when cleaning. That was a pet peeve of mine on another tank. I'm more concerned on how quiet it is. I want my tank as quiet as possible. Nothing drives me crazier than hearing a tank hum like a jet engine, or constant noise if water gurgling or vortex turbulence noises in the room. I would prefer if the tank is totally quiet. So if I understand you correctly, the overflow is almost inaudible? Do you think it would be quiet with running without the herb or style overflow? Thx

 

[wpeterson]

Yes, very quiet. It's in my living room next to my couch, so quiet matters.

If you care about noise, you will want to run a Herbie-style drain (assuming you buy the same 2x 1" drain model.) If you buy the 3x drain you should run a bean animal style drain.

 

[revhtree Verified Admin]

Nice job sir!

 

[reefsahoy]

Thx for the help. There are absolutely no reviews or videos on this overflow and I'm glad I found your thread. I ended up returning the overflow because my sump only has one connection for return and I want to keep it looking good so I decided to use the glass-holes overflow. I had one on a previous tank and it was very quiet and started second guessing myself when I ordered the Eshopps. Thx again and good luck on you tank.

 

[wpeterson]

Tank has been stable, despite the tragedy of losing our clam and most of the SPS colonies. One colony of montipora confusa survived, but bleached out. I've been focusing on filling in LPS and ricordea on the lower levels and then we'll fill in the upper levels with some SPS.

Back in Aug of 2016 I added a small, two head Acan frags:

That Acan frag has grown out into a nice colony with 15-20 heads:

We've had this Euphyllia Anchora for a while, but added a small torch and frogspawn as well:

We added some new Acan frags I'm excited about:

I rehab'ed a struggling Favia colony I found bleached out in a LFS:

I found a supplier for ricordea florida, added 10 small mushrooms to the two existing we had here. I'm hoping to build a nice lower level coverd in mushrooms with a lot of color varieties:

We also added a small, juvenile tuxedo urchin (about 1" in diameter):

Fish are all doing well and stocking has remained stable.

 

[Sm51498]

That acan growth is insane for 6 months. Nice job!

 

[flagg37]

That's a lot of Floridas. Any plans for some yumas or maybe a bounce?

 

[wpeterson]

That's a lot of Floridas. Any plans for some yumas or maybe a bounce?

My plan is to cover the large base rock on the right half of my aquascape's lower level with floridas, which is why I wanted to seed the area with a variety of colors.

We had a beautiful ricordea rock we grew out from 3-4 individuals into maybe 10 in our first tank 29gal tank in Boston:

 

[wpeterson]

Wow, hard to believe it's been 6 months since my last update. We have a a daughter who's almost three and had a son on Jun 1st, so the tank has definitely been getting less of my attention through my wife's pregnancy and with a new baby at home. Thanks to @revhtree for the nudge to update my journal.

Here's the good and the bad over the last 6 months:

• Vortech MP10 wetside failed with a broken impeller shaft
• Large favia colony died of some kind of infection in a central polyp and spread outward
• Infected w/ Montipora Eating nudibranchs, all montis dead, went montipora fallow for three months and beat them - growing out some small monti caps/spongodes again
• Replaced Kessil A350N w/ an H80 for a refugium light
• Bubble Magus Curve-5 skimmer pump seized and I couldn't fix it, upgraded to a Curve 7 earlier in July.
• Added a CO2 scrubber to raise pH, our new house is very tightly sealed vs. the older places we were renting

Otherwise, tank has been good. All fish and inverts happy and healthy. We've had better luck with LPS/soft coral since I replaced the Kessil A350Ws w/ A360Ws but it was the same time we moved, so I'm hoping higher/more stable pH will encourage SPS growth like we originally saw in this tank.

But you all would probably rather see the pictures, apologies for some quick cell phone shots:

 

[revhtree Verified Admin]

Nice to hear from you man!

 

[EmperorVtec]

Hello,

I am new here and hope to ask for some suggestions with the 2 drain type overflow boxes (Eclipse S & M). I hope you don't mind me posting, but have a few questions:

Is the Herbe drain method is the best? Is this power-outage safe, meaning, do I need to do anything else as it restarts itself?

Did your emergency valve trickle any water?

Valve on the main drain line, NO Valve on the emergency drain line?

I appreciate any pointers tips, or updated pictures of your overflow / sump.

Thank you.

 

[EmperorVtec]

Bump?

 

[wpeterson]

I broke this tank down in October of 2021, due to neglect and frustration with the esthetics of my “temporary” tank we planned to replace in a year after I set it up. 5 years later I wasn’t enjoying it anymore.

After rehoming the fish/inverts/coral and selling the tank and dry goods, it was a relief.

Our kids were quite sad, so we ended up setting up an even humbler FOWLR tank in a Biocube 32. Build thread up eventually.