fridmani1

Since I was rebuilding my tank I decided to do some plumbing changes. The biggest change was taking the tank from a single drain to dual drains. The existing overflow had a single drain but I also had a glass lined area used for a return line so that nothing had to run behind the tank. I don't use the return line and I wanted to have a second drain so I planned to cut out the glass panels so that I could put in another bulkhead and drain line.





The first step was to cut out the front panel of glass since I thought I could get to it the easiest. In looking for a method to cut it out I decided to try an X-Acto knife. This actually worked pretty well and I was able to cut all the way down both panels to free up the glass. It took way longer than I thought to get out a single panel about 35 mins. Also I ended up breaking about 3 blades in the process.



I was happy to get the first one out and I noticed something troubling. The back two glass panels actually are glued either on top of or into the seal for the bottom of the tank in the overflow. So if I break the seal the tank will leak from the bottom. But at this point I'm committed to getting the glass out of the overflow. So I cut very carefully down the length of the glass to get to the point just above the bottom. I also cut from the front towards the back on the bottom. After another 20-30 mins of careful cutting the piece is loose and I carefully release it from the tank. The bottom seal looks fine so I proceed with the last piece.






Finally success I have all three panels out and I need to clean up the area. Notice some the Nerite snails that crawled in but could find their way back to the tank.





Now I can add my second drain line to the system. I was planning to just go with dual dursos but in the end I went a different way.

I have a video with my test results that I post as a separate entry.