small hang on refugium

[milkshake]

I have a small refugium on the back of y 20gal. I just put it on. There is a black U shaped tube to bring the water from the tank into the refugium. How do you get the suction to continously run?
Or how do you start a prime in the line? There is no overflow box.

 

[joe18]

use airline tubing to start it off,
i have seen some sort of an air pump used for continous flow, but with a u tube unfortunatley, there iis a chance of loosing siphon.

 

[dchao]

I am confused, you have to tell us that if the water level in the fuge is higher or lower than the main tank.

If it's lower, I sugguest you bring the fuge higher, so the pump sucks up the water from display, and return is via gravity back to the display. (Note: no siphon)

In which case you just fill the refugium up, since the pump is already submerged in water, you just start the pump, and water will be sucked in through the U-tube.

If the fuge is lower, and the U-tube is siphoning the water from the display without an overflow. You are running the risk of overflowing the fuge.

 

[milkshake]

The refugium is the same height as the tank. By the way I bought this (used) from a local aquarist. Looking from the back of the tank, the return pump (from fugium to display). One "U" siphon is to the left along with the middle section for the plant. There is no gravity fed return.

 

[dchao]

Then joe18 was correct. Use airline to prime it.

To prevent siphon break:

1 Make sure the U-tube is clean, and snails can not enter to block the siphon.

2 There need to be enough water flowing through the U-tube, to wash out any accumulated bubbles in there.