Automated Water Changes

NanoReefNoob

NanoReefNoob

New member
Hey yal,

Been a while since my last post, but quick question.

I dont feel that my weekly water changes are working good enough. Algea is becoming a problem even though my TDS meter is at 0 and I have been feeding fish very little and honetly want to up feedings as i dont like feeling like i am starving them. There are multiple problems that it can be, leaching from my barral (4 year old barral) is my main suspect. and I hate dumping water into the tank, i feel that it disterbs the corals and fish to much. Also hauling all the buckets on the same day is really annoying and makes a short job last an hour or two with stairs. So i am looking for a way to make a waterchange over time slowly.

I am looking into using dosing pumps with my reef keeper to do a 2 gal water change pretty much daily. My idea is that I set up two dosing pumps to pump the same amount of water out and in the aquarium over a hour + period a day.

This would eliminate the tempeture being a problem as the water would be added slowly to the tank. Also it would eliminate my barral all together, as I would just make 5 gal (little extra so the pump does not suck air on day two) every two days. this will also get rid of the hour or two to do water changes on the weekends, Simply change buckets every two days, whitch is not a problem as I change filter socks and check the skimmer that offten any how.

I guess my question is this, Is it possible to dial in dosing pumps to pump at the same rate? and is there any problems yal can for see with this method. I have a bench that sits next to my aquarium that will house my 5G RODI bucket, 5 Gallon dirty water bucket, and 5G Salt bucket. I do not have a way to pump my water change barral into the tank as I am renting at the moment, Tank is 60G cube.

Any help is greatfull.
 
Also just a side note, I would use the Reef Keeper to shut off the ATO pump during the time that the water change is happening.
 
I wouldn't count on two dosing pumps to go at exactly the same rate. It might be OK if you keep a very close eye on the salinity. If one of them goes faster or slower even by a little bit, the ATO will hide that fact from you by keeping the total water level the same.

There is a better pump for this. Look for a dual head diaphragm pump. I think Reef Filler has one that I've seen used a lot. This way you know the amount going in equals the amount coming out and things will stay stable.
 
What are your nitrate and phosphate readings?

Instead of covering up the problem with more water changes what about trying to solve it?

It may be as simple as running some GFO to pull excess phosphates out..
 
mcgyvr said:
what are your nitrate and phosphate readings?

Instead of covering up the problem with more water changes what about trying to solve it?

It may be as simple as running some gfo to pull excess phosphates out..
Click to expand...

+1
 
tkeracer619 said:
What kind of barrel?

Why do you think it is coming from it?
Click to expand...

It is a blue plastic barrel that that I bought brand new 4 or 5 years ago. I read something that over time they can begen to deteriorate and leach harmfull things into the water if the water sits in them for to long. It is a 25G barrel and I would make the water every weekend and get the salinity correct. The water would sit in the barrel (with power head and heater) for about 5-7 days befor I would use it.
 
mcgyvr said:
What are your nitrate and phosphate readings?

Instead of covering up the problem with more water changes what about trying to solve it?

It may be as simple as running some GFO to pull excess phosphates out..
Click to expand...

Nitrate is as of last weekend was at 20.00 using the cheap test kit that you get at Pet Smart. A 16% (10 gal) water change was done that weekend, Did not test this weekend as I am out of town

I have read many places on these forums and others that it is pointless to test phosphate because the results are pointless and you end up with an edless cycle of events.

1) test your phosphate, so you spend the money on a phosphate test kit and get good readings then
2) oh well your algea is using up the phosphate faster then you test it (Test kit money waisted), Use GFO (all ready am)
3) less lighting, now my corals suffer and I am forced to spending very few hours enjoying my tank with the $1000 dollar lights i purchased
4) no lighting for three days, and manualy pull out the algea, Now i am not using the lighting that i paid so much for and still simply hiding the problem witch will inevitably come back in a few months any how and the whole cycle will start again.

I can be honest with myself and know that my water change practices are not up to par, that is the reason i want to automate it. Weekends get busy and water changes get missed or fogot or neglected, that is why i am looking to automate them.
 
disc1 said:
I wouldn't count on two dosing pumps to go at exactly the same rate. It might be OK if you keep a very close eye on the salinity. If one of them goes faster or slower even by a little bit, the ATO will hide that fact from you by keeping the total water level the same.

There is a better pump for this. Look for a dual head diaphragm pump. I think Reef Filler has one that I've seen used a lot. This way you know the amount going in equals the amount coming out and things will stay stable.
Click to expand...

I have never seen this pump thank you for the rec, I am researching it now.
 
Reef Genesis, Reef filler, dual head stenner, or peristaltic pumps that can be calibrated like neptune dos or spectrapure litermeter III are all common setups for AWC. For large tanks Reef Genesis is a good option. I've used a dual head stenner before and currently use a spectrapure setup with several fail safes in place.
 
Based on what has been stated so far I would employ carbon dosing to lower nitrates...Assuming you have a skimmer..
Nitrates at 20 will allow algae to grow/thrive some..

water changes is really just covering up the problem (kind of) but if thats the route you want to take then it is a great way to export nutrients.. (it just gets costly after a while)
A $3 bottle of vinegar and a dosing pump (or even manually) may be all it needs and works very well for most individuals..

If you notice that nitrates are not reducing after a few weeks then I would take the GFO offline as it has been shown that if phosphates are too low that nitrate won't drop past a certain level.. As soon as phosphates are allowed to climb a bit then the nitrates will drop even further..

I've had excellent results with carbon dosing on all my tanks over the years..
I've also noticed better results when using carbon dosing + a small dosing of Microbacter7 every now and then even though I'm not a fan of bacteria in a bottle.. I tried it for giggles and it seemed to work.. So..
 
mcgyvr said:
Based on what has been stated so far I would employ carbon dosing to lower nitrates...Assuming you have a skimmer..
Nitrates at 20 will allow algae to grow/thrive some..

water changes is really just covering up the problem (kind of) but if thats the route you want to take then it is a great way to export nutrients.. (it just gets costly after a while)
A $3 bottle of vinegar and a dosing pump (or even manually) may be all it needs and works very well for most individuals..

If you notice that nitrates are not reducing after a few weeks then I would take the GFO offline as it has been shown that if phosphates are too low that nitrate won't drop past a certain level.. As soon as phosphates are allowed to climb a bit then the nitrates will drop even further..

I've had excellent results with carbon dosing on all my tanks over the years..
I've also noticed better results when using carbon dosing + a small dosing of Microbacter7 every now and then even though I'm not a fan of bacteria in a bottle.. I tried it for giggles and it seemed to work.. So..
Click to expand...

Thank you for the imput, I have never looked into dosing of anykind but think i may be getting to the point that I need to put a foot in that pool now that I have a few SPS in my tank. I did run carbon in a BRS reactor for the first few months, but took it out and replaced it with the GFO. I will look into hooking up my other reactors and putting it online, and see what it does.

Thanks again for the help.
 
You're essentially describing the same thing as the liter meter. It should work if they are going about the same rate, you use an ATO, and monitor the salinity to see if it's moving. You'll also need to put safeguards in place that they dont over fill/drain.
 
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