Automatic water change systems help.

[fishtk75]

I reading here as reeffiller and SpectraPure systems.
As Reeffiller how is that setup if you have one on your system then for the SpectraPure the same question. Also how you adjust them to the amount you need?

 

[slief]

I ran the Spectrapure Litermeter 3 with a slave pump as my first automatic water change system. You calibrate the both the Litermeter 3's built in pump and the slave pump separate with the plumbing installed as you would have it connected to your system. Calibration is very important and the length and hose as well as fresh water vs salt water all have a slight impact on the pumps output. Once calibrated, you then do a calculation to determine how many liters per day you want to exchange. You will need to convert gallons to liters to do this. You then input the liters into the Litermeter 3 for both pumps. Once programmed, it will take the number of liters you input and break them up evenly into increments over a 24 hour period. Each pump will alternate turning on and off for short bursts over the course of 24 hours to the sum of your total liters. The higher the liters, the more frequently it will run each and every day. I really liked the Litermeter and would have kept it if I were dosing too but I'm not and instead was using it as a dedicated water change system.

I ended up switching to the Genesis renew system. I did so because as a water exchange system, it's a bit more flexible in that you can program it for daily, weekly or even one time bulk exchanges and it's much faster in doing so at a rate of about 1 gallon every 2 minutes. Also, I don't have to convert gallons or liters or milliliters to program it, nor do I have to setup timers or program my controller to run a dual head pump for a specified time period as you might with the Reef-Filler.

Unlike the Litermeter, the Renew doesn't need calibration as it uses 1 gallon metering buckets fed by power headtype pumps instead of dosing pumps that require maintenance and are metered electronically.

One thing I found with the Litermeter for my application was a drift in flow rates over time. With the Litermeter (like most dosing pumps), you need to stay on top of maintenance. In the case of the Litermeter, cleaning the rollers and replacing tubing were things that were par for course. On a smaller system, it wouldn't be as much of an issue. I changed out about 3.7 gallons per day every day and every 3 or so months I had to do maintenance on the pumps. With the Renew, I don't and I can tell it to change out 25 gallons a day, a week or even a 1 time 25 gallon water change and it will do it at a rate measurable in terms of gallons per minute as opposed to milliliters per minute. That was important to me when it came to my water change needs.

I'm not familiar with the Reef Filler. Looks similar in principal to the Cole Palmer dual head pumps. Both would work but could be less intuitive and slower when it comes to water changes. The good thing about either of those solutions is that they are continuous duty rated pumps which is important but some of those pumps are also very noisy.

 

[Jamey1010]

I use a Cole Parmer Masterflex console drive unit with dual heads, pretty much a maintenance free unit. I just made sure to use good pharmed tubing rated for a high number of hours.

It is a fairly noisy device but is in a separate room than the tank so makes no difference and only runs 40 mins daily to change 3 gallons and it's turned up only quarter way, and there's no calibration needed takes out and adds at exactly the same time and rate.

I was going to go with the genesis system and it looks great but I didn't need really need another separate controller as my apex could already handle what I was looking to accomplish and the whole figuring out how to turn off my ato while it was on was going to involve some sort of tricky float valve system and I didn't really want to buy the storm system too.

The masterflex console drive was much cheaper and made more sense with the amount of other stuff I already had, and I looked in the reeffiller after reading about Randy using them and found they were more expensive, well at least new where it was fairly easy and much cheaper to find a used masterflex.

 

[AcroporAddict]

I use a Cole Parmer Masterflex console drive unit with dual heads, pretty much a maintenance free unit. I just made sure to use good pharmed tubing rated for a high number of hours.

It is a fairly noisy device but is in a separate room than the tank so makes no difference and only runs 40 mins daily to change 3 gallons and it's turned up only quarter way, and there's no calibration needed takes out and adds at exactly the same time and rate.

I was going to go with the genesis system and it looks great but I didn't need really need another separate controller as my apex could already handle what I was looking to accomplish and the whole figuring out how to turn off my ato while it was on was going to involve some sort of tricky float valve system and I didn't really want to buy the storm system too.

The masterflex console drive was much cheaper and made more sense with the amount of other stuff I already had, and I looked in the reeffiller after reading about Randy using them and found they were more expensive, well at least new where it was fairly easy and much cheaper to find a used masterflex.

I have the same setup. Pretty much bullet proof.

 

[fishtk75]

I ran the Spectrapure Litermeter 3 with a slave pump as my first automatic water change system. You calibrate the both the Litermeter 3's built in pump and the slave pump separate with the plumbing installed as you would have it connected to your system. Calibration is very important and the length and hose as well as fresh water vs salt water all have a slight impact on the pumps output. Once calibrated, you then do a calculation to determine how many liters per day you want to exchange. You will need to convert gallons to liters to do this. You then input the liters into the Litermeter 3 for both pumps. Once programmed, it will take the number of liters you input and break them up evenly into increments over a 24 hour period. Each pump will alternate turning on and off for short bursts over the course of 24 hours to the sum of your total liters. The higher the liters, the more frequently it will run each and every day. I really liked the Litermeter and would have kept it if I were dosing too but I'm not and instead was using it as a dedicated water change system.

I ended up switching to the Genesis renew system. I did so because as a water exchange system, it's a bit more flexible in that you can program it for daily, weekly or even one time bulk exchanges and it's much faster in doing so at a rate of about 1 gallon every 2 minutes. Also, I don't have to convert gallons or liters or milliliters to program it, nor do I have to setup timers or program my controller to run a dual head pump for a specified time period as you might with the Reef-Filler.

Unlike the Litermeter, the Renew doesn't need calibration as it uses 1 gallon metering buckets fed by power headtype pumps instead of dosing pumps that require maintenance and are metered electronically.

One thing I found with the Litermeter for my application was a drift in flow rates over time. With the Litermeter (like most dosing pumps), you need to stay on top of maintenance. In the case of the Litermeter, cleaning the rollers and replacing tubing were things that were par for course. On a smaller system, it wouldn't be as much of an issue. I changed out about 3.7 gallons per day every day and every 3 or so months I had to do maintenance on the pumps. With the Renew, I don't and I can tell it to change out 25 gallons a day, a week or even a 1 time 25 gallon water change and it will do it at a rate measurable in terms of gallons per minute as opposed to milliliters per minute. That was important to me when it came to my water change needs.

I'm not familiar with the Reef Filler. Looks similar in principal to the Cole Palmer dual head pumps. Both would work but could be less intuitive and slower when it comes to water changes. The good thing about either of those solutions is that they are continuous duty rated pumps which is important but some of those pumps are also very noisy.

Thank you for all this.

 

[Timber77]

for ato purposes the litermeter is pretty much set and forget. mine is at least 15 years old and besides changing the tubing every few years have not had any issues. I just have mine pulling fresh ro water into the litermeter, then to a kalkreactor which drains down to the sump. would not recommend for water changes as its not pushing alot of fluid quickly. its kinda noisy with a squeek noise, would be the only downside to the device..

 

[fishtk75]

for ato purposes the litermeter is pretty much set and forget. mine is at least 15 years old and besides changing the tubing every few years have not had any issues. I just have mine pulling fresh ro water into the litermeter, then to a kalkreactor which drains down to the sump. would not recommend for water changes as its not pushing alot of fluid quickly. its kinda noisy with a squeek noise, would be the only downside to the device..

Thank you for telling me. I found that there are pumps that show to do 170 gpd I saw.