The "Super Nano" overflow from GH is quite nice; very uniform beveling and feels quite solid. I was surprised to see a removable cover of sorts that wedges above the actual bulkhead outlet, which is meant to contain drain sounds.
Drilling the overflow and return holes. A little tense at first but it went well. I ended up with one small chip on the overflow hole but it's within the gasket. Using plumber's putty to keep a pool of water on the drill bit worked great (a la glass-holes instructional video).
Shot of the back. Really like the minimalism of the GH overflow. Overflow top is positioned 1 1/8" below the rim - with 100-150gph I expect the waterline to be about 1" below the rim.
So the stock ballast buzzed a little - can't have that. So I rigged up a Galaxy Select-A-Watt and it's dead silent thank goodness. It's pretty big compared to the old ballast but not noticeable when the tank is against the wall. Anybody want to buy a Solana 150w HQI ballast (or trade for some good zoas)?
Discovered a new problem last week: the pendent doesn't sit center over the tank... I guess it is centered when there's 3" of filtration taking up the back. My solution was to wall mount it. I went through three iterations of stronger and stronger wall bolts/anchors until I realized it couldn't be held up by the original mounts alone. The weight is so far off the wall that the heavy pendent was pulling my sheet rock out! Rock solid now. :dance:
All lit up! This is a 150w Radium DE (much better blue than Phoenix IMO), but still a little blue for me. I just ordered a 14k Ushio from Hellolights and will try that next. They're having a 50% off sale right now BTW.
Looking good! The GH overflow is very silent. As you can see I ended up placing the MP10 on the other side of the overflow. All the back wall gear really hides away in the upper left corner now. I ended up choosing the Ushio 14K over the Radium. I won't get as much coral color 'pop' but the look is more natural IMO.
Yeah gotta be careful there. Unfortunately there's a plug coming out the opposite side as well, so switching it around wouldn't help. If I fry it its just an excuse to get the Kessil I really want.
Man you have done a great job over hauling a used tank. Looks really clean and shows what taking your time and doing it right gets you. I know the last guy mentioned it buy i would seriously think about moving that ballast. I can tell you first hand that even when your careful and go slow cleaning a rimless tank always results in water going over the sides. If you really want it there you could buy a med. Size Tupperware (one that is a bit larger than the ballast and cut it in half length wise. Then unscrew the ballast and put the Tupperware lid under the ballast before reattaching it to the stand. Then simply snap the Tupperware back to the lid over the ballast. This should keep the top of the ballast covered and the bottom half would be hanging out the bottom where u cut the Tupperware in half. That should keep you dry and still allow enough airflow to the ballast. You could even paint the tupperware if you wanted to make it look clean. Just a thought hopefully it made sense. Regardless great job on the build keep the pics/updates coming.
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