Anyone know of a "flow detector"???

[Pbrown3701]

So i recently moved my chiller out into the garage which required about 20ft of tubing each way for the water to flow. What i did was to put a valve in the return side of my closed loop pump with the output to the chiller just upstream of the valve and the return just downstream (of the valve). I then close the valve slightly until i get flow through the chiller branch. Let's see if this works...


.......................in......................out
to tank ---------T---------X---------T----------CL pump
................................valve

So my concern is once the bubbles are out of the lines for the chiller, you can't tell if their is any flow, so if something gets stuck in the line or whatever, i wouldn't know (besides temp control i guess).

So i'm wondering if there is a good SW safe and cheap "flow meter" or just something to indicate visually that there is in fact flow.

 

[niko5]

I dont know what you looking at in price but this is the only one iv seen.

http://www.marinedepot.com/ps_ViewItem~idProduct~AL1911.html

 

[Pbrown3701]

That's pricey and I don't care to have the electronics. I'm envisioning a floating ball type rotameter or a spinning paddle wheel or something...

 

[niko5]

I have one of these on my fluidbed filters
http://www.marinedepot.com/ps_ViewI..._Aquarium_Supplies_Miscellaneous~vendor~.html

it only goes to 250 gph though.

 

[niko5]

scracth that go to marinedepot.com and search Flow Meter its 12 bucks.

 

[Pbrown3701]

link no worky... 250gph would be plenty. I run pretty slow flowrate through it.

 

[Pbrown3701]

cool. couple of questions: How is the quality (does it leak or anything?). And, what is the float made from?

I suppose, even if you ran a higher flow through it, it would just max out the float. If the flow every was stopped, then you would notice that the float had fallen. I think this may work - thanks

 

[Pbrown3701]

also, it looks like the cap just screws on? I'm running it on an Iwaki 70RLT, so I wonder how it would hold up to higher pressure...

 

[niko5]

The quaility is good no leaks. Only downside was that it came with hose barb connectors but you can get fittings at home depot to plumb it into PVS the threads on it are the 3/4" garden hose type... not regular pipe thread.

The water flows up an outside sleeve and then down an inner pipe i dont think that can take more than 250 gph so not sure if you could go over 250. The float is made of cerimic i think.

 

[Pbrown3701]

So currently, i'm using 1/2" vinyl hose. What size hose barb does it take?

 

[niko5]

I think it goes from 1/2 to 3/4 tubing its a huge fitting start small and gets bigger.

 

[Pbrown3701]

cool. Thanks for your help!