What ATO Do You Have ?

Well I am planing on buy a ATO unit in the next month or so and just want to get some information on which one will give me my best bang for my buck. thanks for all the help ;D

what ATO unit do you have?
how do you like it so far?
pros and cons?

 

Reef Fanatic Level Controller. Has been absolutely flawless for 5 or so years. The only thing is the sensors come with suction cups, which are useless. You can easily rig up something better though, with use egg crate and zip ties, or something like that. After that, it's been set and forget. I use it with an aqualift pump and a kalk reactor. I do have issues with the pump and reactor from time to time, but never the ATO. the tunze seems to get the best reviews, but it's almost 3x the price, so, it should...

 

Tunze.

Pro. It is awesome and arguably the best ATO kit out there for purchase.
Lasers don't fail and muck up like float sensors.
Does not use suction cups

Con. Expensive.

 

oooo looks like maribe depot is having a sale wht do you guys think JBJ Automatic Top Off (A.T.O.) System Water Level Controller

 

I use a BlueLine Tsunami AT-1 for my ATO.

Pro: Cheap compared to other systems (only $40 or so), doesn't muck up like float sensors (if it fails, it will fail in off position), uses magnets instead of suction cups

Con: single switch (no backup, but can add a similar high level switch for more money), Can be inaccurate (normal range is 1.5" between high and low, can be reduced via modifications), need to add your own pump to the kit

 

I haven't heard many great reviews of the JBJ. I would probably stay away from it.

 

not to bash it, I've heard good reviews on it, but I have also heard bad ones... One or two to me is an anomoly, but I've read several negative reviews on it... I wouldn't trust it...

I guess that's another pro for Tunze I should add above - gets all good reviews :laughings

 

ATO.com, been running for 3 months.

Pros- Dual switch model giving some sort of failsafe, accurate, cheap $60 shipped for the dual switch model, comes with a nice mounting bracket

Cons - Have to add your own pump, almost too sensitive(I ended up putting in on a timer so it only ran twice a day)

I have read that you can plug a hole and/or add a snail guard to lower the wave sensitivity a little, but I had a timer laying around, so I took the lazy way out.

 

Right, that pretty much sums it up. There are certainly good reviews, but a large number of bad ones as well. Of course they sell a lot, so that could be part of it, but it has a lot of frills, for the price, which also suggests they would have to skip on quality. This seems to be the case with a lot of JBJ stuff. Sometimes, that's fine, but IMP, not for an ATO, I wouldn't want my living room flooded...

 

Spectrapure UPLC-II. I would put it right up there, in fact on top of the Tunze Osmolator. Not inexpensive but very dependable.
It uses the same bulletproof peristaltic pump as the Litermeter III which has been the standard if the industry for dosing pumps for many years.