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#326
07/06/2004, 03:03 PM
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Quote:
 The booster pump is an Aquatec 8800. MY RO/DI has a auto-shut-off and the booster pump is hooked to a pressure switch. You can tweek the pressure switch with a small allen wrench to have it shut off at whatever pressure you want. I have mine setup to shut the booster pump off a split second before the auto-shut-off shuts off the RO/DI. The higher the pressure through your RO/DI, the more efficiently the unit will run. I run my system around 95 psi with 0 TDS and I can EASILY get an actual 100 gpd out of it. I had the booster pump because when I lived in my apartment the water pressure was a bit lower than I would have liked. The pressure in my house is much higher. Although, the booster pump does help run the system more efficiently, I don't know if I would buy one again. BTW, these things are NOT whisper quiet as advertised. The pump itself is quiet but it shakes like crazy and the mounting brackets are flexible rubber which makes the pump shake even more. The vibration from the pump is clearly audible. |
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#327
07/06/2004, 04:14 PM
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I get 50 psi on a good day. Mostly in the high 40's.
Thanks
__________________
**************** Get crazy with the cheez whiz... I didn't mean to take up all your sweet time Give it right back to you....One of these days |
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#331
07/06/2004, 08:06 PM
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Quote:
__________________
**************** Get crazy with the cheez whiz... I didn't mean to take up all your sweet time Give it right back to you....One of these days |
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#332
07/06/2004, 08:16 PM
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hmm never figured out why that avitar is funny....its has been a long day though
Lunchbucket
__________________
Trying to lose weight by walking is like trying to bake a cake w/ a cigarette lighter - Lunchbucket - "Nancy-Boy Extraordinaire" - maxxII- |
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#334
07/07/2004, 01:46 AM
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AcroSteve, the water pressure in my apartment was around that range also.
 Ruminari, Thanks. Yes, the plumbing is a bit complicated and I'm only about half way done.  RGibson, you are extremely lucky to have such high water pressure. However, it must be painful to take a shower there.  Scuba Dog, thanks for the suggestion. I'm sure the carpet would almost completely eliminate the noise. The noise was mostly an annoyance in the apartment when the RO/DI was in the kitchen. In the house it is in the tank room which is pretty much soundproof so it doesn't bother me anymore.Lunchbucket, That is a pic of his Turboflotor skimmer when he was curing his live rock. I think it's funny that the foam came right out the air holes in the collection cup and then continued down the sides and started filling the sump. Gujustud, Yeah, I work with the mentally handicapped. I think it has made me a little mental over the years.  Thanks for the compliment.
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#336
07/07/2004, 05:33 AM
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Travis - that is what i thought that pic was but i couldn't tell what it was
hope to see you this weekend....prolly sat or sunday. sat we are done in the later evening and sunday we are done by like 5 i think...so maybe sunday Lunchbucket
__________________
Trying to lose weight by walking is like trying to bake a cake w/ a cigarette lighter - Lunchbucket - "Nancy-Boy Extraordinaire" - maxxII- |
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#337
07/11/2004, 01:28 PM
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Actually, I don't mind using smaller sizes like 1" and small but once you get up the 1.5" and larger it is a real pain. I also like the "clean look" of schedule 40. One advantage the spa flex has over sch 40 is you can get by with less elbows. However, once you get up to 1.5" sch 40 they make long turn elbows and other 90's, 60's, 45's, and 22 1/2's with smooth bends that don't create near as much head pressure anyways.
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#338
07/11/2004, 01:32 PM
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I got some more plumbing done this past week. Here are some pics of the in-the-tank plumbing.
     Notice in the front right and left corners I added a couple more pump outputs. These are the outputs for the chiller loop. Originally, I planned to just use a wye and connect the chiller loop to the output of one of the other closed loops. I decided against this as I didn't want any chances of damaging a closed loop pump due to back pressure from the powerful Iwaki 100 chiller pump. What I decided to do was have the chiller return water to the front corners of the tank. This allows me to use a 45 elbow to direct water towards the undersides of the corals in the front of the tank. Another advantage is this will create a upflow of water towards the overflow, hopefully aiding in detritus removal. I drilled the tank with a hole saw. I was a bit nervous but everything went nice and smooth. It did take about 5 minutes for each hole. The spray bar along the back bottom is to push water from the back bottom of the tank to the front bottom. This will keep the detritus from accumulating under the rocks. Notice I cut a 1/4" slot out of the PVC at a slightly downward angle. This will evenly distribute the waterflow across the spraybar and cause the water to come out at an angle that keeps the flow going across the tank bottom. The 1/4" slot should prevent the clogging that can be typical of spray bars with a bunch of small holes drilled for water flow. Also notice that there are actually 2 spraybars with caps on each end. In the middle you can see the caps that separate the two spray bars. The spray bars, along with the 2 tee's at the bottom middle of the tank are connected to the oceansmotions 4-way. This will cause 100% of the pump flow to go through spray bar 1, then spray bar 2, then tee 1, then tee 2, and continue cycling in this fashion. The strong bursts of flow should more than sufficiently keep any detritus from accumulating on the tank bottom. The other in-the-tank plumbing is for one of the closed loops. This loop is connected to one of the actuating valves causing water flow to alternate between the left side of the loop and the ride side of the loop. I designed the in-the-tank plumbing to provide some water flow along the sides of the rock structure and also inside the valley that will be in front of the overflow. |
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#339
07/11/2004, 01:36 PM
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Here are some more pictures of the in-the-tank plumbing from above and the side.
   Here is a picture of the plumbing for the chiller loop outputs. I still need to run pipe from the ball valve union to the chiller once I am ready.  Here is a picture showing the advantage of using so many unions when plumbing. When I need to get back into a hard to reach spot I can just remove the pumps and plumbing at the unions. Even when the tank is full I will still be able to do this without spilling a drop of water. The only difference is I will have to use the union on the other side of the valve so the valve will stay on the pipe to keep water from coming out.  I also ran the lines for the clam tank up to the living room. The drain is 1.5" and drains water from the clam tank overflow to the sump. The return is 1" and returns water from the sump to the clam tank through a Blueline HD 55.  
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#340
07/11/2004, 01:40 PM
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The tile for the tank opening trim came in last week. We made an attempt at it earlier in the week and had a few problems. We tried it again a few days later and it worked out. You can't tell from the pics but it isn't perfect. There are a few minor flaws that are no big deal and I'm sure I'll get used to in a couple days. It took 4 of us over 6 hours that night. The small pieces of tile did not want to stay in place. The top was the hardest. At one point we all had to take turns holding up a board against the top tile for 15 minute intervals until the mud set good enough that the tiles wouldn't fall right off the wall. The whole process was very frustrating but it turned out pretty darn good in the end. Like I said, it's not perfect, but we did it ourselves. If I were to do it again I would either hire a professional to lay the tile or I would build a wooden frame that would hold the tile in place long enough to set. All that is left to do on the viewing side is grout the tile and paint the wall.
  This last picture is a shot taken from a distance level with the bottom of the opening. Notice you can't see any of the plumbing that is on the bottom of the tank. This is because I built the opening to cover the bottom 3 inches of the tank. This gives me plenty of room to hide the bottom plumbing and the eggcrate rock support structure. I also ordered some reef safe black epoxy paint from Aquatic Eco Systems to paint all of the plumbing inside the tank. Even though it will all be covered with rock, painting it black will make it even more unnoticable.  The paint will be here tomorrow along with the check valves for the return lines. Once I paint the PVC it needs to cure for 7 days and then be washed with an ammonia/water solution. Once the paint is cured it's time to start filling the tank. 
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#341
07/11/2004, 04:07 PM
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absolutely gorgeous! How many hours of planning did this bad boy take?
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#342
07/11/2004, 05:35 PM
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Travis i have 2 stop postinf 4 a while u have me very dizzy at the moment trying 2 decipher !!
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JOHN boy |
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#344
07/11/2004, 07:12 PM
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Awesome tank but I have a few questions:
Why so much flow? There as been many tanks with less flow but are among the most beautiful? What are your goals with all those pumps? How do you plan to keep that area under your stand cool? Why bunch everything in the stand area and use elbows when you have a whole fish room and can use flexi pipe? Are your pvc parts glued?-- I'm thinking no since I see no primer. Aside from all that, you have a very beautiful tank. As someone who thinks a lot and is very technical, I appeciate whats underneath the tank and how it works rather than whats inside. |
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#345
07/12/2004, 02:28 AM
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This tank has been in official planning since the beginning of February.
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#347
07/12/2004, 02:32 AM
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That will be the true patience test.
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#348
07/12/2004, 03:00 AM
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[QUOTE]Originally posted by qwuintus
[B]Awesome tank but I have a few questions:[QUOTE] Why so much flow? There as been many tanks with less flow but are among the most beautiful? What are your goals with all those pumps? There are a couple main reasons for the flow. The first is that this is will be a barebottom sps reef in which a super low nutrient environment is desired. The best way to acheive this is by removing detritus before it can start breaking down. With this much flow I will be able to keep detritus out of the display and have it removed by the very oversized skimmer before it becomes a problem. This will lead to a low-maintenance tank with a high flow/low nutrient environment for sps corals. The other reason is purely experimental and because I am an equipment freak that likes to take things overboard. SPS corals seem to prefer rediculously high water flow to the point where it is near impossible to create that much turbulance in an aquarium. I believe that flow (lots of random flow) is the second most important element to keeping SPS corals next to water chemistry. I have designed this system to mimic a high energy zone of the reef where SPS corals thrive. Also, I'm planning to focus on keeping the more exotic and "hard to keep" SPS and am hoping higher flow will make them thrive better. High flow also corellates with less occurence of RTN.Quote:
Quote:
Instead of just the tank in the room there is now a filtration closet (pics to come soon), 75 gallon quarantine tank with a filtration stand, large wash tub, washer, and dryer. And I don't like working with flex pipe due to its tendency to retain its shape from packaging. I also like the look of a tank plumbed with hard pvc over one plumbed with flex pvc. Quote:
. The only thing that isn't glued is where the in-the-tank plumbing connects to the bulkheads. I will glue these after I have painted and washed them. Quote:
I had a controller built for my actuators. I can change the settings on the controller by hooking it up to my computer. From there I can program how often each individual actuator turns from seconds to minutes to hours. I can also program which direction each one turns to at what times. Finally, it also allows me to set a different "calm" time for each actuator where it will not turn for a specified amount of time. I can't wait to start playing with this thing.
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#349
07/12/2004, 04:24 AM
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U know how much money i could have saved if i waited 2 months 4 live stock ??
__________________
JOHN boy |
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#350
07/12/2004, 10:02 PM
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Travis - sorry for not stopping by...after SCUBA i was tired and wanted to get home. i NEED to get to your place ASAP and stop you crazy butt. you are freaking crazy man!!! OMG...i want a bigger tank now..and if you ever want to get rid of any of those pumps let me know
Lunchbucket
__________________
Trying to lose weight by walking is like trying to bake a cake w/ a cigarette lighter - Lunchbucket - "Nancy-Boy Extraordinaire" - maxxII- |
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