No comments? OK, I guess I'll just keep this thread rolling. I'm going to do a water change today, so I guess this is as good a time as any to tell/show how I do it. I was initially changing about 10 gallons every 2 weeks, but I increased it to every week in order to cure my clownfish of its lymphocystis. Now that it's cured I think I'll go back to every 2 weeks. I don't have the most simple or automated setup for water changes, but it's functional and I can do it in about 20-30 minutes.
First of all, I mentioned the specs of my RO/DI unit previously. I got it
here, and here's a picture of it. Due to its weight when full of water I mounted it onto a piece of wood (that I painted and beveled the ends for improved appearance), and the wood was drilled into the wall studs. This unit is mounted over the utility sink in our laundry room. I collect the waste water and we use it for house plants, and any extra goes into the pool. The 5 gallon waste buckets fill about every 20-25 minutes and it's a PITA carrying the water outside to the pool, but I hate to waste the water. I place the waste water buckets in the utility sink while they're being filled in case I forget about them and they overflow, and that extra water goes down the drain, but I try to minimize that.
What's that you say? Overkill for my little 30 gal tank? Yes, I agree, but it will be just perfect once I get my monster system in the future
. For those of you who don't remember, I'll describe the different chambers. Perched horizontally on top is the 50 gpd Dow RO membrane. I want to upgrade this since it takes about 1.5 hours to make 5 gallons of RO/DI water, so a 100 gpd membrane is on my holiday wish list. Looking from right to left, the first chamber is a 1 micron sediment prefilter. The next 2 chambers are the "blaster" carbon filters. They're more than just the standard carbon block filters in that they remove all chloramines as well. I'll quote the website: "Activated catalytic carbon for chlorine and ammonia removal (NH2CL). Also removes other volatile and organic compounds." There are two of them because this (supposedly) improves their efficiency. The last 2 chambers on the left are dual DI chambers that contain a color changing resin. This lets me know when they're no longer working and require replacement. The good thing about this is that they work on a one-at-a-time basis. The chamber on the right has nearly turned red all the way to the top (you can see the color difference in the above photo), and once it peaks out I'll shift the DI on the left to the right-sided chamber, and I'll replace the used DI. The blue square unit is a "total dissolved solvent" meter and the water I'm making has a TDS of 0.
Ideally the RO/DI water produced by this unit would drain directly into a storage container. I do have a 40 gallon storage container but it's in the garage (right outside of the laundry room), and I'm meeting resistance about putting a hole in the wall to pass the necessary tubing. Currently I have to remember to turn off the sink when my 5 gal container of RO/DI is full, and carry it out to my storage vessel. I have a feeling that all I have to do is "forget" that I'm making water one day, the laundry room will flood, and there will be much less resistance regarding that small hole in the wall :smokin:.
I mix my saltwater in two 20 gallon trashcans, and the water is constantly circulated with a MaxiJet 900 powerhead (one in each can). There's also a heater in each trashcan so that my water is ready to use at an instant's notice. Through some trial and error I have figured out how much water and salt to add to these containers in order to make water at a salinity of 1.026. I marked the inside of these trashcans with a "fill line" for RO/DI water, and I have a separate container that I marked as well with a salt "fill line." I simply fill the trashcan with water to the fill line, then fill the salt container to its line, then slowly add the salt to the trashcan with the powerhead on. In less than 24 hours the water is clear and I always check it with my refractometer to ensure the salinity is where I want it.
Here's my garage work area. Forgive the sloppiness, I had just finished a FWE treatment and my mesh filter bags were being hung out to dry.
In the corner is the black 40 gal storage container for RO/DI. I have a float valve and an auto-shutoff device that I can plumb into it once I have "permission" to drill that little hole in the wall. By the way, for when I'm ready to do that, does anyone have any suggestions as to how I should seal around the tubing that passes through the wall so that bugs/cold air don't get into the house from the garage? Next you see the 2 trashcans where I mix and store my saltwater. The rest of the gear requires no explanation.
So for my water changes, I suspend all detritus from my rocks with a turkey baster then siphon out two 5 gal buckets of water from my display. If there's detritus built up in my sump I'll siphon that out as well. Before draining the tank I have 10 gallons of mixed and aerated saltwater sitting beside my cabinet at the ready. Here's how I move water from one container to another. I used to use a bucket and scoop it, but now I use this.
It's just a MaxiJet powerhead fastened to some flexible tubing. When I want to transfer water, I just drop this into the source container, plug it in, and let the pump do the lifting for me. I also use this device to transfer my new saltwater from buckets into my sump during water changes.
If anyone has a better idea on how I can do this, please let me know. I'm considering plumbing some bulkheads into the storage container and trashcans and placing a Mag pump in each one of them. When I need to transfer water I could simply turn a ball valve on the external plumbing and bingo. This would kind of be like Weatherson's setup, but not nearly as sophistocated. Overkill? Maybe, but it seems like something fun to do.
