The Automatic Reef

121

121

Member
Is there a product available that you can program to dose liquids into your system at a controlled rate? I'd like the option to set it to dose from say 2 drops per day (12AM and 12PM) to once every minute 24/7.

The idea is to completely automate my tank to dose anything I want like vodka, potassium, alk, calcium, top up water, chilled foods etc.

By testing the water each week I can change the drip rates of each one to correct the balance of everything.

I'd like to set this up so I only have to refill each dosing product once a month or so.
 
There are a lot of peristaltic dosing pumps on the market that will allow you to accomplish this. A couple of drips per day is pretty fine tuned, however once every minute should be easy to accomplish. Occasionally, you can find some deals on used medical grade IV pumps that allow you to dial things in to the drop.
 
Thanks, I'll look into peristaltic dosing pumps.

I was also thinking about trying to build something simple that could be set to simply open a clamp at a set time.

For instance, say you had a gallon of RO water mixed with a measured amount of calcium chloride. Theres air line tubing glued to a small hole in the lid.
The bottle is set upside down with a clamp on the end of the air line.

I'd need something to open this clamp for a second or two to allow for one drip. Something as simple as possible.

I could possibly try writing something with my limited knowledge of C++ (like a simple alarm clock type programme) that could open the clamp and run everything through a laptop.

Does anyone have any ideas?

I'll log my progress here as I go.
 
<a href=showthread.php?s=&postid=15442352#post15442352 target=_blank>Originally posted</a> by 121
Thanks, I'll look into peristaltic dosing pumps.

I was also thinking about trying to build something simple that could be set to simply open a clamp at a set time.

For instance, say you had a gallon of RO water mixed with a measured amount of calcium chloride. Theres air line tubing glued to a small hole in the lid.
The bottle is set upside down with a clamp on the end of the air line.

I'd need something to open this clamp for a second or two to allow for one drip. Something as simple as possible.

I could possibly try writing something with my limited knowledge of C++ (like a simple alarm clock type programme) that could open the clamp and run everything through a laptop.

Does anyone have any ideas?

I'll log my progress here as I go.
Click to expand...

I would avoid any gravity drip setups if possible. The risk of something going wrong is high and you could end up nuking the tank. Murphy definitely hangs around reef tanks.
 
I use a Profilux system for the purpose you mention and dose Alk, CA, and Vodka. I believe the lowest dosage rate is 1ml, so that's more than a drop. You can program it to dose this amount from 1 to 24 times per day. I have 4 pumps but don't use them all currently.

The only thing it doesn't do well (or I just haven't figured it out) is replacement of evaported water because ideally you should also have some type of float valve/electronic eye gadget too. I use a Tunze Osmolator. It works perfect, as I combine it with my kalkreactor.
 
Does anyone know if you can use the Reefkeeper Lite along with dosing pumps to dose daily? I would imagine it is something along the lines of having the pumps on a timer and just timing out how often to turn them on.
 
<a href=showthread.php?s=&postid=15442944#post15442944 target=_blank>Originally posted</a> by surge19us
Your looking for a dosing pump with controller like these.
http://www.marinedepot.com/dosing_pumps_top_off_spectrapure_litermeter-ap.html
Click to expand...

Wow, all that equipment came to $893.

I know nothing about electronics atm but I'm wondering if a similar device could be made at a fraction of that cost.

I want complete control over the drip rate. I want to programme 0.1ml per second if needs be.

I''m going to look into this and update this thread.

For now I will call this project (which doesn't actually exist yet) Reef Mateâ„¢ V 0.1 Pre-Alpha :lol:
 
ebay, masterflex. i use and like them. bought the cal/alk dosers for a total of $120 including the 4 feet of the most expensive tubing.

bought my vodka doser for a total of $55 with a brand new in box 20rpm drive.
DSCN0208.jpg




bulkreefsupply also has there own brand of dosers.
 
You can't really drip 0.1 ml. He said 1.8 ml a minute, so if you want to dose 10 ml per day you would just set the timer to turn the pump on for 5 minutes and 55 seconds. You can get pretty exact. That is why its good to use a controller as opposed to a cheap timer, because you can go down to the second and control exactly how much you dose.
 
This may be a silly question, but why not get one dosing pump, mix a batch of water with a very high concentration of everything you want to dose, then run it at the appropriate rate. It would seem to me a bit of math and a little basic chemistry to avoid inconvenient reactions and you could keep everything happily dosed without having to figure out how to dose 2 drops of anything a day.
 
Only problem with that is that its hard to maintain your different parameters individually. For instance, depending on your changing reef you may need to start adding more of something to keep your levels where you want them. In that case you would have to throw your whole batch away. Also, i'm not much of a chemist but I think there are reactions that happen when the two compounds are mixed that you want to keep for the tank. All in all it would just make things a lot harder.

I don't think anyone answered my earlier question. Does anyone dose with a reefkeeper by using dosing pumps and setting timers?
 
This may be a silly question, but why not get one dosing pump, mix a batch of water with a very high concentration of everything you want to dose, then run it at the appropriate rate. It would seem to me a bit of math and a little basic chemistry to avoid inconvenient reactions and you could keep everything happily dosed without having to figure out how to dose 2 drops of anything a day.
Click to expand...

Good idea but it would only work with chemicals that wouldn't react with each other and can dissolve into each other without becoming a suspension. As an example, dosing vodka mixed with water would not work because the alcohol would float to the surface.

On the other hand, it could reduce the amount of dosing pumps needed if you had a few different solutions that mixed well together.

As for the precision factor, you could keep the pump running all the time and dilute the mixture to the point where it is very minute. This would take a lot of thinking and effort on your part.
I do agree that running a dosing pump on a timer could work to deliver very small ammounts.
 
If your dosing drip by drip constantly though wouldn't you eventually add way to much water to the system?
 
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