I'm making an overflow for my 54 gal corner reef. I just had a 20X20.5" sheet of 1/4" ABS cut today to make the overflow in the back of this tank.

I'm going to put the sheet of ABS across the back of the tank at a 45 degree angle to the sides. So parallel to the front of the tank since it's a corner tank. Well, at least as parallel as you can get to a curved front (you know what I mean).

The top edge will be 20" long, and the heigth from the bottom of the tank to the line where I want the water will be about 20"

I just have a few questions:

1) Should I cut teeth into the entire 20" length of the overflow?

2) How deep should the cuts for the teeth be? I want the water depth around 20" and the ABS is 20.5" tall, so I'm guess that about 1" deep cuts would give me a 20" water line, but I have no idea how to calculate this.

3) How wide shuold the cuts for the teeth be?

4) How much space should there be in between the teeth?


Thanks!

Anyone? Is there some formula for figuring out how far to cut the teeth to get a certain water heigth?

depending on flow rate i would be tempted to not have teeth.


for each hole/tooth to tooth
the formula for velosity of water through an opening ( hole)

v = 8 x the squar root of the height of the water ft/sec


the rate of flow (speed of flow through a hole this size)

rate = A (area) x v (velosity)

rate = 8 x A x the squar root of the hight of the water x ft cubed/sec

Flow calculator at reef Cent.....com is a great place for this.

What ever the width of the tooth is the same space that needs to be between the teeth. Most will not go deeper than 1.5"

No teeth here and it works well with my mag 5 30 gallon cube. Not to mention how clean it looks.

yeah, there's a reason why the zero edge tanks loo so good.

How about noise? Does having or not having teeth make a difference in noise levels?

Depends on the person, ive heard loud people with all of their teeth and without their teeth. Then quiet people with all their teeth and no teeth.

Oh come on you know this thread sounds funny when you think about it!

teeth will make more noise. but if the flow rate is to high over the weir, your clown will start selling tickets to the water slide.

also the easy fix is no teeth with some kind of a strainer. check out tigahboys most exellent 35 thread.
is also in the overflow thread but his thread has more pretty pics.

I looked through the first 6 pages and didn't see any strainer. Are you taking about that piece of acrylic that is suspended like an inch or so over the overflow? That's the only thing I could see there. Or maybe I just had to read on to page 30 or something.

here try this
http://www.nano-reef.com/forums/index.php?...9372&st=160


might be faster.

Ah, thanks. The gutter screen approach.

I guess I could just set it up without teeth and then add a screen later if needed.