Marineland 60 Cube Owners: Plumbing Questions...

[Sokretys]

I will hopefully be purchasing a brandy new cube in the next few days. I've used the glass holes o boxes and like them. I've successfully made my own. I've got access to a sweet drill. But I would like to go with the RR cube due to convenience. And i like how it drains tank water from the column as well as the surface.

I've read through pretty much every Marineland 60 Cube RR build that i can find on the internet. And needless to say there are mixed reviews. From what i gather, the white pvc elbows that are within the stock marineland overflow box come pre-installed and cannot come out without cutting them etc. is that correct?

If you put your drain vent on the outside of the tank on top of a T (i've seen this method a lot and am leaning towards it), but do you leave the hole in the top of the drain 90 open. I am contemplating putting a dab of silicone over it. But id like to hear some first hand experience. I've also read that they are both loud and quiet when done this way and loud/quiet when done another way.

I want to make sure that I have a fool proof plan of plumbing the RR version before i go ahead and make the order.

Thank!

 

[BlackSmith]

I will hopefully be purchasing a brandy new cube in the next few days. I've used the glass holes o boxes and like them. I've successfully made my own. I've got access to a sweet drill. But I would like to go with the RR cube due to convenience. And i like how it drains tank water from the column as well as the surface.

I've read through pretty much every Marineland 60 Cube RR build that i can find on the internet. And needless to say there are mixed reviews. From what i gather, the white pvc elbows that are within the stock marineland overflow box come pre-installed and cannot come out without cutting them etc. is that correct?

If you put your drain vent on the outside of the tank on top of a T (i've seen this method a lot and am leaning towards it), but do you leave the hole in the top of the drain 90 open. I am contemplating putting a dab of silicone over it. But id like to hear some first hand experience. I've also read that they are both loud and quiet when done this way and loud/quiet when done another way.

I want to make sure that I have a fool proof plan of plumbing the RR version before i go ahead and make the order.

Thank!

Hi. You stopped by my 60 cube journal the other day. First ill say COOL, another Marineland 60 cube . I will try leaving the OE durso hole open and try it with my finger plugging the hole before I permanently seal it. Also my definition of loud may be different from yours. Loud in the middle of the day, or loud when people are trying to sleep? I did A LOT of online searching for any and everything regarding the Marineland 60g RR Cube. It seems to me that the external durso\PVC setup Im going to run, has been tried and tested by many before us and that design has kind of been adopted as the "go to" method for that tank. Not that it can't be done differently and well. Just that the design I'm using in my journal seems to be the most popular setup for that tank.

 

[Sokretys]

Sounds good. A lot of people have smart phones these days. There is a free android app called "Sound Meter Lite" that seems to work pretty well at getting a db reading.

BlackSmith, I see that you ran your drain line to the right at 3:00 then hit your T. I'm toying with the idea of running the drain line from the 1" drain bulkhead down at 4:30 to a 1" wye. Then the vertical section about it will be a bit longer. It would seem to be a more smooth transition to the sump and perhaps quieter. My concern is that it will still vent properly.

Regardless of how I plumb it, I think i will go with this 3/8" barb x 3/8" male pvc Needle Valve. Drill a 3/8" hole in the endcap, glue the needle valve in and cut the barb off, then reeeally fine tune it. Only $10 too

The needle valve:

http://www.usplastic.com/catalog/item.aspx?itemid=32216&catid=662

 

[BlackSmith]

I like your needle valve idea. I couldn't find the size necessary to run a 45 degree instead of the 90 from the overflow I have setup now.

 

[Bobbofin]

The older ones had the overflow flat in the back middle and you could not remove anything. I royal pain imo. I have seen some with the overflow in the the back left corner since. I didn't want to deal with it and installed a glass holes 300gph overflow.

 

[Sokretys]

I just order a Deep Blue Edge 60. I don't feel like micky mousing with a bad design. I'll likely be running a Bernie Style drain system. Seeing as how the bottom isnt tempered, ill likely be enlarging the 3/4" bulkhead hole in the bottom if there is room to make 2 1" drain lines. Then ill drill the back for the return.

Thanks for everyone's input. It helped steer me away from the Marineland haha