help... surge problem

[bluenassarius]

i turned a empty 5g IO bucket into a surge bucket. i have a major problem. the drain dumps the first time but does not fill up for another dump... instead it keeps sucking the water out at the drain pipe. i bought a ball valve to adjust the flow into the bucket but that did not help either... PLS HELP!!

 

[pepe.king.prawn]

how does the water leave your surge? does it siphon over once the bucket fills up enough? If so.... perhaps the diameter of the pipe flowing out of the surge is not large enough? It needs to be able to siphon out everything so quickly that it breaks the siphon.. which would mean.. you need a big pipe to get big flow?? just a thought. taggin' along.

 

[Mr. Ugly]

Big siphon pipe plus slow fill rate should work, I thought.

 

[Sparkss]

I read somewhere that 2" was the minimum recommended pipe for a surge, but don't ask me where I read that

 

[Marc Daniels]

What you need to do is drill a small hole in the outflow pipe just above the water line. Start with a small hole, and then just keep making it little larger until you get it right. This allows air to flow in between cycles and completely break the syphon.

 

[Marc Daniels]

Check this out http://www.masla.com/reef/csm.html

What you need is #10 in the drawing.

 

[Vincerama2]

try cutting an angle at the bottom of the drain pipe so that it's not horizontal at the bottom of the bucket.

I'm assuming this is a Carlson surge device, and not a "tipping over bucket" surge device?

V

 

[Elite]

Is this for your 7G Sam??? :lol:

 

[bluenassarius]

thanks for all the responses guys. i have 3 1" bulkheads in hte 5g bucket... for intake, output, overflow. i'm thinking i do need a bigger bulkhead for the drain... i'd like to try marc's method before giving up totally on the setup i have in place.
phong, it's for my prop tank :lol:

 

[Sparkss]

BN, What prompted you to add a surge to your prop tank ? do you run one now on your main display tank ? Any success info/stories ?

not to go too far off topic, but someone told me the other day about the benefits of having a surge, in that it stimulated growth and also improved water clarity in a way that was still unexplained. (aside from the detrius clean up). Anyone have any before and after stories to share ?

 

[Vincerama2]

yeah, I wish someone with some skill(z) could build a surge tank using, say a 10g AGA tank or 5g bucket and write down exact specs to build one. I know they are notoriously fidgety to build. Most DIY sites sort of hint at what's needed but no actual plan of a Carlson surge that works properly and could be used on a typical (say 30-100g) tank!

V

 

[Lordhelmet]

I would love to have a exact step by step detailed instruction as well. from all that i have read and heard corals show much more growth with a surge then with regular powerheads.
who wouldn't want better water movment then tunze for less cost.

 

[jtong]

I just setup a Carlson surge a couple of months ago. It was pretty easy to setup and works perfectly. The only draw back is that it is a little noisy. It's pretty cool when the surge kicks in. The fishes don't really mind when it surges because they just stay in the path of the wave and not go hidding behind rocks.

 

[Sparkss]

Jtong,
Care to share the details of the setup ? What was the surge water holding tank, how did you set up the siphon and siphon break ? what was your feed pump ? What is your display tank size ? Any design pictures ? either drawn or actual photos are both nice. Thanks

 

[Sparkss]

here is an interesting link that I just came across :

http://www.petsforum.com/personal/trevor-jones/surge_device.html

 

[bluenassarius]

i did what marc recommended and my surge system works now. thanks a bunch marc! i can finally sleep now..

 

[Marc Daniels]

Cool. I'm glad that it worked. Did you start small and get larger, or did the first shot do the trick?

 

[Mr. Ugly]

Sparkss,

Another good reason to do surge is that you can get a ton of good water movement without using a ton of electricity for pumps.

I saw the prop setup that the Aquatic Collection guys use. 2 big tanks tied into a common sump and skimmer. Skimmer is on a timer. And main water movement is through a Carlson surge that's run off a small fill pump. Clean simple efficient setup, I thought.

 

[bluenassarius]

Marc,

I split the surge into 2 tubs. i drilled the first pvc pipe ... didn't work, had to drill the other to break the siphon cleanly.

 

[Elite]

Sam,
wanna take picture of your setup??