OP
OP
Ok, here we go... How NOT to design an overflow box 
Let me just start by saying that while my box does work great, it took way too many hours of engineering and machining time for it to be worth it. I do however have a new appreciation for why these things cost a small fortune from the store.
I had decided to make my own overflow box after realizing that they cost upwards of $75 to be purchased. So, I priced out some acryllic and found it would still have been a little expensive to make the box the way I wanted, and then an idea came into my head. Why not modify a hang-on isolation container, or in this case, 2 of them. They're made of a polystyrene which is another form of acryllic, so I could use acryllic glue, this should be easy. So, I went out and bought two of these boxes for a whopping $10 and set about my work.
My first mistake can be seen here in making the exterior box:
You'll notice I decided to put a wall in the box to separate the chamber and keep the U tubes that connect it to the main tank constantly siphoning. The basic theory is that if the tank water level ever drops below the level of the teeth in the overflow box, one half of the box (behind the wall) remains wet while the other half with the hole in it drains... Great idea, except one could have done it WAY easier by just putting a tall tube of acryllic. See, those little hang-on containers... They're not square. As a matter of fact they're equal sided trapzoids. There is a 1.4 degree angle on them. So, I had to mill out the center wall so that it would fit flush and so that the side walls had that 1.4 degree pitch. Once I did that, I acryllic glued the wall in palce and prayed. Leak tested it and everything was fine.
The other obstacle was bulkhead fittings. I couldnt find those cheap, so I got on the Lathe and made one myself out of some stock we had laying around at the shop. So basically, I took a threaded pvc fitting, and glued on to it a pvc flange with a rubber gasket in it. Then, drilled out the bottom of the overflow box, and screwed the modified fitting into a right angle pvc fitting inside the box to keep the noise down.
Once that box was completed, I put the inner box on the mill, and carved out some neat teeth as you can see here:
And then finally, I cut off part of the lip of one side, clamped the two together, drilled, and bolted them as one piece with some nylon bolts. Here's the finished product (minus the siphon tubes)
While I was able to do this, and it only cost me a whopping $10, it cost me MANY hours of machining time to get these made, and if I had it to do all over again, I would have went out and bought one
Let me just start by saying that while my box does work great, it took way too many hours of engineering and machining time for it to be worth it. I do however have a new appreciation for why these things cost a small fortune from the store.I had decided to make my own overflow box after realizing that they cost upwards of $75 to be purchased. So, I priced out some acryllic and found it would still have been a little expensive to make the box the way I wanted, and then an idea came into my head. Why not modify a hang-on isolation container, or in this case, 2 of them. They're made of a polystyrene which is another form of acryllic, so I could use acryllic glue, this should be easy
. So, I went out and bought two of these boxes for a whopping $10 and set about my work.My first mistake can be seen here in making the exterior box:
You'll notice I decided to put a wall in the box to separate the chamber and keep the U tubes that connect it to the main tank constantly siphoning. The basic theory is that if the tank water level ever drops below the level of the teeth in the overflow box, one half of the box (behind the wall) remains wet while the other half with the hole in it drains... Great idea, except one could have done it WAY easier by just putting a tall tube of acryllic. See, those little hang-on containers... They're not square. As a matter of fact they're equal sided trapzoids. There is a 1.4 degree angle on them. So, I had to mill out the center wall so that it would fit flush and so that the side walls had that 1.4 degree pitch. Once I did that, I acryllic glued the wall in palce and prayed. Leak tested it and everything was fine.
The other obstacle was bulkhead fittings. I couldnt find those cheap, so I got on the Lathe and made one myself out of some stock we had laying around at the shop. So basically, I took a threaded pvc fitting, and glued on to it a pvc flange with a rubber gasket in it. Then, drilled out the bottom of the overflow box, and screwed the modified fitting into a right angle pvc fitting inside the box to keep the noise down.
Once that box was completed, I put the inner box on the mill, and carved out some neat teeth as you can see here:
And then finally, I cut off part of the lip of one side, clamped the two together, drilled, and bolted them as one piece with some nylon bolts. Here's the finished product (minus the siphon tubes)
While I was able to do this, and it only cost me a whopping $10, it cost me MANY hours of machining time to get these made, and if I had it to do all over again, I would have went out and bought one
)
. They're reportedly tank bred and raised and supposedly eat a wide fariety of foods. I took my time acclimating them as per Navarre's sticky instructions which lasted about an hour. They got in the tank and were busy exploring things right away. I'd take pictures but with the tank lights off, you'd be hard pressed to see them so you'll all have to wait until tommorrow 
