daily water changes anyone?

[Joey]

And Joey what good bactiria are you talking about?

Every tank need bacteria for it to be alive if theres no bacteria you loose allot of food for invert,snails,starfish,shrimps.Even tho they eat brine shrimp the bacteria creates algae somethings in your tank feed off of that algae.I mean its not that your not going to clean out your tank.But you need to let bacteria grow for you to be able to have your home made reef.how douse the cycle works on BACTERIA and then creates the ALGAE and then come your purple Coraline algae.Not trying to be a smart a over here lol just giving my opinion :.

 

[jayman10134]

I was thinking about setting up and auto water change system ,I know saltyolddog does it, I was going to try about 2 gal a day for a total of about 14% a week. Put some pumps on timers and pump out 2 gal then have another pump pump 2 gal back in. This way I would know it is only pumping 2 in and 2 out so I would still be able to tell the amount of evaperation I was haveing. I also think I am going to set up a kalk drip, with a dosing pump running all day, which I hope to get to match evapertaion very closely.

And Joey what good bactiria are you talking about?

there really isn't that much bacteria just in the water, they are usually found on surfaces of rock, substrate, and glass.

i was thinking you could just run the 2 pumps off of the same timer so you know they are pumping the same amount in as they are out. if you use 2 of the same pumps of course.

 

[Cjtabares]

Yeah, that's true I was just typing quickly on my Iphone sorry. And verry little bactiria is in the water, I would think that the good "stuff" that would be removed, bactiria, pods, ect, would be minimal.

 

[Jocko]

Yeah you're not going to have any detectable impact on bacteria populations via the water removed by a water change. The main things you're doing are:

1. Keeping the levels of random trace elements in your tank water closer to what they are in your salt mix. The actual benefit of this, I will leave open to debate.
2. Removing dissolved organic material. If you're running a skimmer, then you're mostly removing hydrophilic (prefer to be dissolved in water) organic molecules. If you don't run a skimmer then you're also removing hydrophobic organic molecules since you don't have a skimmer taking those out for you. Note that carbon is also an effective means of removing hydrophilic molecules from the water. It all depends upon how you like to roll.

And lastly, regarding the automated and/or continuous water changes, I would not personally under any circumstances risk doing this with two separate pumps. You would definitely want to use a 2-channel peristaltic pump!

 

[cilyjr]

i was thinking you could just run the 2 pumps off of the same timer so you know they are pumping the same amount in as they are out. if you use 2 of the same pumps of course.

even with 2 of the same pumps say 2 maxijet 900 even the slightest difference in the pump impeller speed, length of tube its pumping water through, or height it is pumping from will make a difference. i would monitor this real close in the begining

 

[Cjtabares]

Yeah thinking about it a 2-channel peristaltic pump might be a good idea. I have only thought about it quickly, have not done any real research.

 

[jayman10134]

even with 2 of the same pumps say 2 maxijet 900 even the slightest difference in the pump impeller speed, length of tube its pumping water through, or height it is pumping from will make a difference. i would monitor this real close in the begining

thats true, i didn't think about any of the head differences that could happen. 2 gallons a day isn't tough though even without it being automatic.

 

[Cjtabares]

I would be more worried about the 2 gal going out with out more going in then the other way around.

 

[jamesdong009]

Just get one of these

http://www.seavisions.com/prod02.htm

 

[pillowfish]

My .02 would be that anything you "automate" in your system has the potential to fail at some point. If you do set up an automatic/continuous water change system you will need to maintain the equipment regularly to ensure it continues to work properly. IMO seems to sound like a lot more work than regular water changes. Also something to think about is whether or not you go away frequently and who will monitor the tank/equipment/volume of water you are changing and replacing in your absence.

For me personally I would not feel comfortable with relying on ph's and peristatic pumps for WC, there are too many ways for this type of set-up to go wrong(and in this hobby I think we all know too well, if it can go wrong.....it will..eventually). Just MHO.

 

[JasonandRay]

I was thinking about setting up and auto water change system ,I know saltyolddog does it, I was going to try about 2 gal a day for a total of about 14% a week. Put some pumps on timers and pump out 2 gal then have another pump pump 2 gal back in. This way I would know it is only pumping 2 in and 2 out so I would still be able to tell the amount of evaperation I was haveing. I also think I am going to set up a kalk drip, with a dosing pump running all day, which I hope to get to match evapertaion very closely.

And Joey what good bactiria are you talking about?

put kalk in ato. thats what salty dose iirc

 

[Cjtabares]

I think salty told me he uses a peristaltic pump of some sort to dose kalk. I was going to see if I could find a pump that would let me dose it all day long at a slow drip to keep parameters constent. But I need to find a pump that could run all day at a slow rate.

 

[emabie]

Just get one of these

http://www.seavisions.com/prod02.htm

Better yet, Pay me the $3000 and I will stop by every morning and change a gallon of water for you!!!!

Seriously though, I think you could do it if you used an electronic float switch set up, similar to a 3 switch ATO hooked up to an Aqua controller.

One switch at the normal sump water level

One switch at the "2 gallons" of water removed level in the sump

One last switch slightly higher than the normal level as a maximum turn off in case switch one failed.

You could program it like this:

1.Turn off your regular ATO
2. Turn on waste water pump till low level switch turns on. (set this timer to just slightly longer than it takes to pump out 2 gallons in case switch fails)
3. Turn on WC pump till normal sump level switch turns on (Also set a timer so that this stays on just slightly longer than it takes to fill in case switch fails)
4. Turn back on ATO


I am not saying it would be fool proof or that I would do it, just saying I think it could be done.

 

[Jays333]

I just got the Spectrapure Litermeter 3, along with the water exchange unit, auto top off control module and an additional remote. I am planning to auto change 2 gallons a day, plus the auto top off. They highly recommend setting it up and testing it in some 5 gallon pails. I am currently doing 20 gallons a week, with a settling tank, and it's very easy. So ironically I have been procrastinating setting up the automated water change because it seems like a lot of work.

 

[shawn]

Yeah thinking about it a 2-channel peristaltic pump might be a good idea. I have only thought about it quickly, have not done any real research.

That's what I've done for years now. If you are willing to wait a bit you can pick up a (used) lab quality dual-channel peristaltic pump on ebay for less than $150. There have been numerous threads over the years that have touched on this topic - try searching for "auto water change" or "continuous water change".

For a really old one:

http://www.bostonreefers.org/forums/showthread.php?t=3554