Quote:
Originally posted by kmleah
However, if your WC water is less saline, it will be less dense than the tank water, causing it to rise in the water column, so the water you skim off down the drain will partially be new water, defeating the purpose of the automatic water change system.
It would be better to manuallly adjust the salinity back where you want it by removing some saltwater and replacing it with fresh on occasion.
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If the less-saline new water was dripping into the main tank at a relatively slow rate (dependent on the difference in salinity of the new water compared to the tank, and the estimated evaporation rate for the system), and the overflow drain was in the sump below, the mixing would be sufficient to still make the water change system pretty efficient. I'm talking a slow drip system, like those used for FW flow-thru racks, rather than the on/off pump system you and Anthony are discussing.
One idea would be to incorporate a rotifer tank in this system. Something like:
a. At the top, a 10g tank with new water at ~1.019 and frozen phyto added manually each day, dripping into -
b. 2 2g rotifer bottles (for redundancy in case one crashes), overflowing into -
c. the main tank at ~1.024, overflowing into -
d. sump, with overflow drain to sink, or enough extra height so you can manually remove water every few days when you add new SW to the 10g on top.
You've got auto-water change, -top off and -rotifer feeding all in one. You'd need to check salinity regularly, and keep a careful eye on the roti pops as you would with any live culture.
Ryan