Balancing manifold pump

srobertb

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Neptune COR-15 pump running a refugium at 220gph split off with a 3 way manifold. Carbon, UV, and TBD. New tank. Lines and pumps are all super clean.

Currently manifold is offline. Pump is at 40% power and refugium valve is closed about 60% of the way.

The refugium stays solid at 210-230gph but about once every other week fluctuates wider and wider until it errors. It doesn’t happen gradually over a long time but over 3-4 hours. This is why I’m running the pump at 40% and dialing it back. I thought that running it at 15% with the valve wide open may be causing the problem. This fixed it…then didn’t…sometimes turning the pump on/off fixes it. Sometimes opening the valve then setting it back to 60% closed fixes it.
Tried adding carbon using a BRS carbon reactor on the manifold. Dialed it in, then it dipped over a week from 200 to 0 and I gave up and took it offline. Can’t see any clogs.

So…is there a trick to balancing all this crap or is it just a matter of tweaking the pump power and valves until everything is working the way it should?

I’m thinking run the COR-15 at 100%, then dial in everything with valves but what’s the point of the DC pump at that point. Would I be better off with a more powerful pump? I’m wondering if the COR-15 just can’t deal with all this + 2’-3’ of head height.
 

Blue Spot Octopus

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It is all a bout volume and pressure, some pumps are better with pressure, what about using a dedicated pump for the manifold? Maybe an Eheim.
 
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srobertb

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It is all a bout volume and pressure, some pumps are better with pressure, what about using a dedicated pump for the manifold? Maybe an Eheim.
I have 2, COR-15 pumps from a previous build so I really wanted to use them as the refugium/manifold; my return pumps to the DT are separate.

Breaking off the manifold would be a PITA but going with a bigger pump is probably the next option.
 
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