Filtration ----

chen88

Super Moderator
Seems to be working good. Cold water into main tank also cools down temp which allows me to run both my sump pump. Will grab some photos shortly. Nit getting much sleep since putting this in. Something about constant water into tank and I'm not watchin!
 

chen88

Super Moderator
Well on my 3rd full day of running my auto drip system, all seems good so far. Checked ammonia this morning...."0".

Just curious, any of you with the auto drip system co any water changes? Ie once per week or none at all?
 

hondas3000

New Member
Ok, I'll do one per week and see how it goes

why waste more water and time if its not necessary. If water test show no sign of bad water and fish have no sign of heavy breathing then I don't think there is better then that. What I would do is once in awhile I would add some seachem Prime to the water.
 

Joey

Moderator
Large water changes still have benifits that a drip does not.. thats why they can and generally should still be carried out... just not as often as you generally would. You can even get by on skipping them while away. They are not mandatory, but still benificial.

Dont add extra chemicals to the tank if they are not needed... whats the point?

Prime removes chlorine, chloramine and ammonia... all of which should not be in his tank anyway....
 

RDFISHGUY

New Member
Only water change I've done in the past year on my 230 was when I moved the tank across the room to make room for the 360. No problems at all. No sick fish. No ammonia. Before that I had some valves crater and overdosed Prime killing my ray. Its been running for a year problem free now. I don't even use the fancy carbon filters. Just sediment filters and dose with Prime. Even when the dosing pump quit working I still never had problems. We have chloramine in our water which I thought would be a problem but so far it hasn't caused me any grief.

I look at it this way: you can run the expensive filters and not know when their life expires or you can add Prime and refill your dosing container as it gets low. If you don't have chloramine in your tap water a jug of Prime goes a long way. If you do have chloramine get Seachem safe and dose for the amount of chloramine in your municipal water supply.

If you have no ammonia or nitrate readings then water changes are useless. You are doing water changes every day with the drip. This way everything stays constant. Large water changes will only cause large swings in your water parameters and lead to more problems IMO. At the end of the day its your tank and you have to do whatever makes you sleep at night.
 

hondas3000

New Member
Large water changes still have benifits that a drip does not.. thats why they can and generally should still be carried out... just not as often as you generally would. You can even get by on skipping them while away. They are not mandatory, but still benificial.

Dont add extra chemicals to the tank if they are not needed... whats the point?

Prime removes chlorine, chloramine and ammonia... all of which should not be in his tank anyway....

Prime® also promotes the production and regeneration of the natural slime coat, and you also need to add prime when doing water change anyway. Beside I have no idea how effective my carbon filter remove chlorine so I just take extra step.
 

chen88

Super Moderator
well...onto day no. 5 so will check tonight when i get home on the chem of the water....if no signs of ammo and nit...then no change and will monitor!...
 

chen88

Super Moderator
Here's some simple shots of my drip/auto water changer system...quite easy to be honest but too me a good part of the day to install as I was also changing out some of my media in the sump and also waiting for everything to run properly. I used clear tubing to the drain for the reason that I am able to see the water flow from the sump to the drain...always like to see water flowing somewhere! Lol...

Here's the 1/4" incoming line from the filter into my main tank
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1" Bulkhead from sump out to drain
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45degree elbow out from cabinet to drain into basement...you can also see the 1/4" tubing incoming from the filter..I could have hard plumb this portion but then it would be hard for me to lift up my heating vent when I want to do any manual water change....also this is flexible so no concerns about the kids (or myself) wacking it..
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Here's the drain and water line from filter in the basement...
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Actually that's it...nothing magical, nothing too good looking :) and took me almost 25 years to do (and longer if you guys hadn't started it here!)...lol

I'm on Day 6 of it being installed and still hesitant of no manual water change at the moment but will monitor water param's every other day for now...yesterdays reading for ammo and nitrate was "0"...PH was at 7.8-8.0 which is normal for my area....

I didn't realized the cap of my sump but I managed to filled only have of my compartment with 142 pcs of the BH from Eric...I thought I'd have a few left over so filled the rest with a Jap Mat like Mat I purchased from a Koi place in Markham early summer and only now had used it...it'll help break down the crap too before the water gets down to the BH and more..
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I'm going to have a huge sale on my bio balls soon...lol...I have enough bio balls to fill at least 3 sump in my backyard..:)
 

DaiDee

New Member
Thanks for the pics Chen.

I didn't see this question answered so I'll ask again.

What do you guys base the drip rate on?
 

hondas3000

New Member
looking good chen, except the pics where you have it through the heating vent :). Look like you can heat up the water pipe with that too.
 

hustler

New Member
If you have a full shot of the sump i would love to see it, get a feel for the baffels and the flow
 

chen88

Super Moderator
looking good chen, except the pics where you have it through the heating vent :). Look like you can heat up the water pipe with that too.

Lol, I know, need to cover that! Lol

All I know is that tomorrow will be a full 7 days since my last manual water change and all readings are still 0. This going great so far!
 

danfong88

New Member
Lol, I know, need to cover that! Lol

All I know is that tomorrow will be a full 7 days since my last manual water change and all readings are still 0. This going great so far!

the return is tie wrap to the gas line? is that to building code???

It looks great !!! have the sump in the basement is great!!!! . You have pictures of your fish collections?
 

skynoch

Moderator
Thanks for the pics Chen.

I didn't see this question answered so I'll ask again.

What do you guys base the drip rate on?

I base my drip rate on what will keep my tank at around 10-30 ppm nitrate. I good place to start is 100% tank turnover for a week.
 

skynoch

Moderator
looks good chen, your concern over manual waterchanges will fade very quickly. Have you tried shutting off your pumps for awhile and then turning back on to check your water levels after a simulated power failure?
 

rudy

Moderator
looks good chen, your concern over manual waterchanges will fade very quickly. Have you tried shutting off your pumps for awhile and then turning back on to check your water levels after a simulated power failure?

Why? he has a 1 inch Bulkhead. I would venture to guess...it would be right there!!
 

chen88

Super Moderator
Yes!....I've switched off my pump even before putting in the 1" bulkhead and never overflows as I also have a back flow valve on the output into the tank...but with the 1" bulkhead it flows right down into the drain so even with a power outage...and as long as the water is still available...I'll still have water change at 60-70gpd without power since I have my water dripping into the main tank!
 
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