Well, as thedude mentioned, I've been away for a week. We got some plumbing taken care of before I left. Thanks John and Clint for your help. I thought I had everything I needed before starting, but you know how that goes. Anyway, I'll show you what we got done so far. First off, here was the bait for getting some help.
No plumbing project should ever be attempted without these, IMO.
The first thing we did was to move the tank away from the wall to take down the mirror. Everything was re-leveled, then the plumbing on the closed loop began. Here's the CL pump, a Sequence Barracuda.
The drain to the pump is 1.5", and critter protection is provided by this strainer. The pipe is double male threaded and screws into the bulkhead and the strainer. This elevates the strainer 6" off the tank bottom to keep sand from being swept up into the closed loop.
Notice in the image above that the Barracuda was resting in the pan. I didn't like that since any drips would accumulate in that pan, and I didn't want the pump to be submerged. The pan is 2 and 1/4" deep, so we just elevated the pump temporarily on a few scraps of 2x4. To account for the extra thickness needed for vibration control, a few layers of drawer liner material was added to both the top and bottom of the 2x4's. Eventually I'll make a more suitable base for the pump to be affixed to, but this worked in a pinch.
<img src="http://i16.photobucket.com/albums/b27/mjosephs/179g%20rimless/4way-1.jpg">
Notice all of the turns that the drain pipes take? This is not ideal, I know, but I really wanted the pump fan to blow out the back of the stand toward the wall, to dissipate heat instead of blowing it into the cabinet. This also made the return plumbing a little easier. Here's another view.
<img src="http://i16.photobucket.com/albums/b27/mjosephs/179g%20rimless/4way-2.jpg">
And finally, a close-up of the 4-way with SUBV's at each outlet.
Not pictured is the plumbing inside the overflow box, both the drains and returns. For the drains, I went with CJ standpipes due to the experiences of greenmako and others.
It doesn't look like much was accomplished, but it actually took a while, especially when you include the unwelcome but almost expected trip to Lowes. At that point, progress was severely halted due to a lack of gray spa-flex and not enough gray 1" fittings. I ordered everything I thought I would need and, alas, I still haven't received the spa-flex in the mail. Hopefully it will come later today, and if not then early next week. As always, I'm happy to hear your comments.
. please for the next post have the pics ready :lol: .
