Coral Tank from Canada (1350gal Display Tank)

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I am also not aware of any commercial live-food dosing/feeding systems.

I have the FaunaMarin NPS foods dosing on a GHL pump... this works well... I'm also going to be dosing shrimp-egg (or similar) once I find a way to source it at reasonable cost using the same dosing pump. But these are fine-particle sized dosing... Phyto and Rotifers may also be dosed this way....

Moving into larger size foods, non-dry pellet stuff... i'm very curious if there is any commercial grade products... I've not seen any throughout my goggling/searching...

For that matter, i've yet to see a clear, clean DIY solution for large particle feeding, live or frozen... it's not an issue, imo just of live vs frozen, it's more about particle size, i think and dosing accuracy/control.
 
Spirofucci said:
I have no experience with auto feeders. But I would think that best practice would to feed by hand in order to ensure just the right type and amount. I also would think that any malfunction would be disasterous. I know that most of the system is automated but it seems that feeding is one of the most "fun" things that a tank owner does. Just my two cents.

mark
Click to expand...

I believe this is for when he goes on vacation.
 
I have not yet come across anything (commercial or DIY) that comes even remotely close to satisfying the functions of dispensing both frozen and dry food. I'm sure it can probably be done, but I do think it would be such a niche solution, that most commercial developers would choose another pet project.

As was mentioned earlier, there is no shortage of dry food; and even some liquid food dispensers available to hobbyists, though they be available at a scale totally dwarfed by the magnitude of this particular system. I'd bet that if we looked in the direction of commercial grade hoppers, we might find something that may just be a little too big... but then again, maybe just right!!

As far as frozen foods go, I think you are most definitely into DIY territory. Some of the meaty food requirements I think can be viably met by adapting/employing one of those live food/refugia previously referenced in this thread by Mr. Wilson, and other contributors. The basic principles have been identified, and I really think it's just a matter of refinement before you get down to a strategy of just having to supply a commercial live phyto product, on some regular occasion bundled into some bi-weekly or monthly system management routine. The planctonite greenbox is one of the neater solutions I've seen crop up within the realm of this feed automation topic.

For the more specialized of frozen foods, which cannot be bred in a residential refugium, I'm pretty confident that one of the previously disclosed DIY refrigerator solutions can be adapted to dissolve a brick of frozen food on occasion... but in my opinion, this is definitely a DIY challenge topic.... care to put a ransom on it Peter... a bottle of wine to the one who brings it in... frozen or thawed??? :hmm1:
 
swissgaurd said:
was looking into this a while back,trout and salmon farmers use large fish feeders
http://www.audet.biz/499finalreport.doc#_Toc110693050
this was a report done on fish feeders

vic
Click to expand...

Elliott said:
wow, now that's a auto fish feeder! If available I'd buy one :thumbsup:

Peter, if you go this route and build it please count me in for one :)
Click to expand...

Although I love seeing this it won't be of any help at this time.

That's just a senior design project for two electrical engineering students at U-Victoria in British Columbia, Canada. Although awesome...it probably never made it off the professors desk after it was graded.

You could definitely replicate that system using their provided report although it doesn't show any extensive testing over time. I think that using a fridge would be a far more viable option for you if it boils down to DIY.
 
I know you don't want DIY but I am far to busy to feed the queen angel frozen twice a day so I had to make something. I consider myself better than MacGyver at coming up with crazy inventions LOL Hey how do you think I came up with the self cleaning, auto tds creep flushing, RODI system.

Long story short I used a part from a ice maker (from fridge). It runs and keeps the cubes cold. (I either buy cubes or break pieces into nice square pieces) Then I use a timer and solenoid to open the ice maker door twice a day. It drops out usually 2 cubes.... sometimes a little more. Hey I didn't say it was production ready. It works pretty good though. Mind you I used a old broken fridge that was at my warehouse, so ordering this part in I wouldn't even know where to look. I'm sure it could be found.

Well anyways the cubes fall into a container which I then have a controller using water to fill the food container with water. Then the controller "backwashes" when really it is just pumping water back into tank. Well this water contains the goods (food).

Peter for your tank I can think of 100 different ways to get food to your tank automatically. Yours is easy as you have all the room in the fish room.

If this all sounds crazy confusing, I will make a video of it working. Problem is this time of year I don't get home until this late in the evening and the system has already fed the tank by now.

If your looking for a unit already out there, I have done all kinds of google search and can't find anything. This may be the job for Duct Tape, some plastic containers and a fridge LOL actually no Duct tape has been replaced by recenet technology.... PL Premium. Its the new mans best friend.
 
I can't seem to find the thread right now, but Randy Holmes Farley uses an Automatic Feeder to feed Arctic-Pods to his tank. IIRC, it should be adaptable to feeding frozen.

I do believe, however, that it is a DIY setup.

Maybe one of the RC wizards out there can find the thread. I believe that it was in Randy's own tank pic thread.
 
How about a number of seawater resistant solenoid valves controlled by timers (can be profilux controlled) that open at a specific time (not all at once of course) just before a pump kicks in connected to the solenoids controlled by a different timer (also profilux controlled), in order to flush the defrosted but cooled food from a container after the solenoid valve.
The number of solenoids/container connections would limit the number of feedings (besides space/costs). You only need to time the defrosting time to prevent clogging by large unfrozen parts of food and make sure the pump is running long enough to thoroughly flush the container and the exit line.
 
Full Picture --- Count The Fish Contest ! ! !

Full Picture --- Count The Fish Contest ! ! !

0_0_e4b945b2d60adb959cc8f85ce0b60160_1



Prize to be announced...........


Peter
 
I see 10...but wat is more important is that beautiful sohal.

One of my favorite fish...also: great photograph. The light is perfect.
 
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