Auto Water change through skimmer questions

Ahh.. I see. I miss understood that. That does make a significant difference. I have no problem investing $200 in equipment, especially after you have demonstrated the versatility of it as well as this piece... Another benefit is the ability to scale water changes with it as well, meaning doing a 2.5 gallon water change is as easy as doing one that would drain my entire sump (30 gallons or so) I will be purchasing it when I swap over my ATO, from there making the relay is silly easy. Thanks again for all your help. Even if I don't use my skimmer for water changes everything I am setting up to do it will still be nice for long travel on a regular wet skim. (the ability to drain a larger skimmer cup remotely will still be nice)

 

Ya, that will be nice. One good thing about running wet is it stays cleaner longer so that will help too.

For you you can just do two changes a day for two gallons..... it might be able to top off two gallons at one time before the time is up and going into alarm.

One thing that is nice is that the Tunze has the shut off if it does not top off so it does not burn up the pump... it will alarm (if you configure the audible alarm for that) and then the unit will shut off... to reset it all you have to do is unplug it... but if something were to go wrong with you out of town, and you feel you know what's up or you want to continue, all you have to do to reset it is turn off the out let with Apex and it will reset when you power it back on, it will then top off with what ever you have your relay on.

The top off pump only costs $25. When you but the ATO, it comes with plenty of hose for the pump. all my stuff was right next to the sump. When I went to add the second pump I still had enough hose to do everything. I only tell you this because it is Euro so that means metric and it is a special size... you can't just go to HD and get some. I think 6 ft or so comes with. If you have a long run or think you need more to do what you want, you will need to order it from Tunze USA. I think most of the retailers have spare pumps and hose though. I know you can get the pumps most places... I used Aquacave and they had pumps and spare hose. Just a heads up.

 

Got my bucket plumbed... Then realized the extra bulkhead is unneccesary. The line from the skimmer is half the size of the first bulkhead, so there is no way the skimmer can fill faster than it can dump lol..



I also have the plumbing set for the skimmer to the bucket. I just don't have the float switch and evac pump yet.

 

that is the best bucket everrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr

 

WHO DAT!!


Anyone know how long you can keep salt water mixed up in a food safe barrel? I was thinking the container will last anywhere from 2 weeks to a month (I may only decide to change a gallon a day, because I don't think I'll need much more than that anyhow... Really the only purpose is to remove build up of some mystery unknown elements and to replenish other unnkown mystery elements anyhow... My nitrate and phosphate should be fully covered by my algae scrubber and protein skimmer.

 

Ok.. after all this I have come to my decision how to handle my auto water change. After experimenting with the skimmer and a few long conversations with Coralvue (the makers of my SRO-3000int reef octopus skimmer) I am convinced that using my skimmer is going to be a pain and there is really no upside over traditional skimming. So, I have decided not to take this route.

While I love the Tunze idea for an auto water change, I don't want to spend the money right now. I looked at the pieces I already had sitting around and here is what I came up with...

I'm going to use 2 BRS 50/ml a minute dosing pumps. At the start of each hour one will pull water out of my sump for about 5 minutes then the next 5 minutes my other pump will add water back in. During this time my ATO will be off. Skimmer will be uninvolved. (this is only about .1 gallons an hour) For a total of 2.4 gallons a day! Simple, reliable and I have all the pieces sitting around.