EcoTech Marine VorTech MP40 Release Information

I just realized it probably was not the best idea to post all that here in the this thread, sorry to all, going to remove it

Jarone I'll start another in filtration and lighting.....
 
I understand everyone's frustration. I guess I am one of those "paying beta testers." I don't love the idea.

BUT...............................

THE FLOW FROM THESE THINGS IS AMAZING! You really have to see it in person to truly appreciate it. It pulls as much water as it pushes. In a smaller tank, the water will be moving in every nick and crany of the tank with just one pump. If the controller really does what they claim it will do, the possibilities are going to be endless.
 
Pumps going from the factory end of this month will feature rigid wet frame covers, ceramic driveshafts (will potentially last for the life of the pump), and wet frames with manufacturing improvements to end any related failures. The frame covers and new wet frames have been shipping for a few weeks now.

-Tim
 
I don't think there's a pump in the country sitting on a shelf right now.

IceCap will be shipping pumps in relatively large number in September (that's the plan) and all of them will be at the revision Tim described above. There have been some bumps in the road but we now have a better, more resilient product than what we demonstrated at MACNAS last year.

Andy
 
<a href=showthread.php?s=&postid=7967107#post7967107 target=_blank>Originally posted</a> by ReefWaters
I have a few questions....

How did you determine the 30 hour run time for the BB? Was this from testing or from a formula?

Will it be possible and/or easy to recharge the BB at a remote location? For example, at friend or family member's house. I ask b/c in the South East, we often lose power in parts of the city but not others. It would really be nice to be able to take the battery somewhere, charge it, and bring it back to your tank that is without power.

How long does it take to fully recharge the battery if it is fully drained?

Once the controller is out, will the BB run the pumps according to the controller settings or just at one constant speed according to the dial on the white box?


Thank you for listening to our feedback.
Click to expand...


Andy and/or Tim, I know you guys are very busy but would you mind providing some answers to the questions above?

Thank you,

Ross
 
Sorry Ross, I seemed to have missed that question.

Our run times are based on actual experiments. We unplug the pump and time how long it takes for a fully charged battery to expire at different pump speeds.

We achieved a range of 30 to 36 hours depending on pump speed.

-Tim
 
Ross,
"How did you determine the 30 hour run time for the BB?"
From formula, my tests at home and that of our beta sites.

"Will it be possible and/or easy to recharge the BB at a remote location?"
Very easy. Unplug the recharger. Remove the quick disconnect line that goes from the BB to the driver. Take the BB and recharger to a lit part of town and recharge. Full recharge from a drained battery is 12 hours. We will sell a BB w/o a charger that can be used to double the run time (daisy chained) or as a backup so the pump is running 30 - 36 hours on the other BB.

"Once the controller is out, will the BB run the pumps according to the controller settings or just at one constant speed according to the dial on the white box?"
ETM question. I don't know.

Andy
 
The current plan is that when the controller is out the battery backup will operate the same as it is now.

However, it is possible that we may allow the customer to program their own battery backup mode protocall. We certainly could with the technology that we're using, if people think that would be a good feature.

-Tim
 
Thanks for the replies. I could probably do something like 2 BB and one piggy back battery (for 2 pumps) and be able to run one of the pumps virtually indefinitely on battery if the power goes out and I have a place to recharge one battery at a time. That's a heck of a lot cheaper than a generator made to run the whole system, or even just the pumps for that matter.

<a href=showthread.php?s=&postid=7982019#post7982019 target=_blank>Originally posted</a> by EcoTech Marine
The current plan is that when the controller is out the battery backup will operate the same as it is now.

However, it is possible that we may allow the customer to program their own battery backup mode protocol. We certainly could with the technology that we're using, if people think that would be a good feature.

-Tim
Click to expand...

I think the more options the better. But of course, I'm sure we would all like it to be as user friendly as possible. And sometimes, more features can make that more difficult.

I know you aren't wanting to give out much info on the new controller, but it almost sounds like the interface will be similar to that of the Neptune controllers. Computer based that is. Am I even close? :D Come on, just one hint. :rollface: :cool:
 
I would hope that the BB would reduce the speed to lengthen the battery time. With a system of multiple pumps like mine, it would be good to have maybe half on back up battery to maintain enough flow to keep the reef alive.

Under normal circumstances, our outages are fairly short, but we did have a 2-day outage recently. Being able to recharge a BB at another location is a must.
 
ReefWaters-

No hints. It's gonna rock though :D

Jnarowe-

Under battery backup mode, we do already reduce the speed of the pump to roughly 1/2 speed. The battery is small enough that you can pick it up and move it, no problem. I'd recommend having multiple BB's if you want total protection such as this.

-Tim
 
I cant remember if this was answered before or not...

but will it be set up for one BB per pump or can multiple pumps run off of one BB? Obviously the 30 hour mark = 1 BB + 1 Pump and would be the ideal situation. Just trying to figure out options.
 
The BB has ports to run two pumps off of each unit, albeit reducing the run time in half (down to 15 hours).

Alternatively, you can plug one BB into another BB and then into the pump. This will acheive twice the run time (60 hours).

-Tim
 
<a href=showthread.php?s=&postid=7977711#post7977711 target=_blank>Originally posted</a> by EcoTech Marine
Pumps going from the factory end of this month will feature rigid wet frame covers, ceramic driveshafts (will potentially last for the life of the pump), and wet frames with manufacturing improvements to end any related failures. The frame covers and new wet frames have been shipping for a few weeks now.

-Tim
Click to expand...


Can you give us some more details? What are the "manufacturing improvements" in the wet frames? What are rigid wet frame covers?

Thanks
 
The manufacturing improvements to the wet frame refer to the steps that we took while manufacturing the wet frames to ensure that the failures that occurred over the past few months do not occur again.

The rigid frame cover is a new plastic part which snaps onto the back of the wet frame. The gasket is glued onto this part so that now, when moving the pump around, the entire wet side is contained as one part, versus the wet side plus the gasket.

-Tim
 
<a href=showthread.php?s=&postid=7982745#post7982745 target=_blank>Originally posted</a> by EcoTech Marine
The rigid frame cover is a new plastic part which snaps onto the back of the wet frame. The gasket is glued onto this part so that now, when moving the pump around, the entire wet side is contained as one part, versus the wet side plus the gasket.

-Tim
Click to expand...

Is this a retro part? In other words can it be snapped on to existing wet frames? I was hoping this was what you were going to do when I was having my problems originally. The solution I got was a sticker for the magnet. I still believe some of my problems are caused by the gasket rubbing the magnet. This would obviously eliminate that.

Please let me know what you can do.

Ross
 
Are you going to be at MACNA this year? Will you have the official VorTech on display with the battery backup? Will you be selling battery backups at the conference?
 
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