Canopy and Stand Build for 42 Gallon Hex Tank

[n2585722]

That is sweet. Considering the same setup for my tank. Have you double checked the alkalinity values with a salifert test and is it close?
Are you going to connect your alk to the X10 to allow it to adjust the alk on it's own?

I have ran several test at the same time and they are never the same but it varies as to which ones are higher or lower than the others. I was doing the Hanna, Fauna Marin, Salifert, KHC and the iV/X10 when testing. It has been a while since I have done that and now just do the Hanna once a week when doing my other manual testing. They are usually within .3 of each other. There is an offset you can change on the Hydros to make it read closer to the manual test you will be using to double check. I would wait for the pumps to break in and recalibrate after a few days of use though. I do use dynamic dosing to dose All for Reef and a KH buffer using the alkalinity readings from the iV/X10. Below is one of my KH schedules for daytime. I use a different one with lower doses for the night time. Those are the first 2 screenshots. The last 2 screenshots are the dosing schedule for All For Reef dosing.

 

[tritonpower]

I have ran several test at the same time and they are never the same but it varies as to which ones are higher or lower than the others. I was doing the Hanna, Fauna Marin, Salifert, KHC and the iV/X10 when testing. It has been a while since I have done that and now just do the Hanna once a week when doing my other manual testing. They are usually within .3 of each other. There is an offset you can change on the Hydros to make it read closer to the manual test you will be using to double check. I would wait for the pumps to break in and recalibrate after a few days of use though. I do use dynamic dosing to dose All for Reef and a KH buffer using the alkalinity readings from the iV/X10. Below is one of my KH schedules for daytime. I use a different one with lower doses for the night time. Those are the first 2 screenshots. The last 2 screenshots are the dosing schedule for All For Reef dosing.

great. thanks

 

[MickeyCT]

Great thread! Awesome skills!

I was very interested in what you did for your mixing station with having everything through the lids. One question and I apologize if you included this information somewhere in the thread and I missed it. What are you using to actually mix the saltwater and how does the cord for the mixing pump come through the lid? Do you also have a heater in there?

I assume you aren't using a PMUP to do the mixing.

 

[n2585722]

Great thread! Awesome skills!

I was very interested in what you did for your mixing station with having everything through the lids. One question and I apologize if you included this information somewhere in the thread and I missed it. What are you using to actually mix the saltwater and how does the cord for the mixing pump come through the lid? Do you also have a heater in there?

I assume you aren't using a PMUP to do the mixing.

I use a Sicce 1.0 pump. I have three of these since I was also using them with a couple of reactors I originally had setup. So I figured I could always use it as a spare if I needed. I do not have the reactors setup on the tank at this time though. I don't use a heater in the mix tank or fresh saltwater reservoir but I do auto water changes and that is split into 4 times a day. There is not much changed at any one time so temp has not been an issue. It does not make a change in the temp when the water change happens. If I want to do a manual water change then I would need to heat the water to the correct temp but I would move it into containers that were near the tank. As far as wires other than the low level and full float switches those are just draped over the side of the brute can and the lid clamped shut. Since the water is not heated there is not too much evaporation to worry about. I usually wait for the warmer days to add the salt mix when mixing and add several smaller amounts over 2 to 3 day time period. Once it has the right salinity I just press a button to let the controller know it can be used to refill the fresh salt water container. I have a temp sensor that is at at air temp in the garage where the reservoirs are at and it has got in the low 40's to over 110 degrees at times. Usually the cold weather will only last a couple of days at a time.

 

[MickeyCT]

Thanks for the explanation.

I am almost done with a project moving my sump from under the stand to my basement. Just need to clean up the wiring and the DOS's and dosing tubes. Next project i to build a new mixing station and your ideas really interested me. I'm heavily invested already in Apex but I can do a lot of what you've done with my existing Apex equipment.

My big decision is whether I want to change from doing 20% water changes using 1" hose/piping, to something smaller and daily water changes. Water changes now only take me about 15 minutes tops. If I switch to 3/8" tubing, then I'm really ruling out larger water changes. Hmmm. Need to think about that.

 

[n2585722]

I don't think there would be an issue doing it with an Apex. I was using a Archon to do it before going to the Hydros. I don't have a basement so I used the garage for my mixing station. When I got my first Hydros controller I was passing signals between the Archon and Hydros and slowly added to the Hydros. I now have 14 controllers in my Hydros collective. CoralVue decided to take a different approach and instead of having a main brain and several modules they decided to make each module where it can be a stand alone controller or be a member of a collective of controllers. In the collective the inputs and outputs are shared with the collective and it act like one large controller.

 

[n2585722]

I got a Minnow to test out a few months back. They are now available for purchase. I decided that using the 2 pumps for auto water change would give them a good workout so I decided to do that. The Minnow is a controller with 2 dosing pumps and 4 sense ports for inputs. The sense ports are not new but they do get used quickly especially in larger collectives so they are nice to have. The dosing pumps are considered smart dosers since the flow rate and direction can be controlled. The Minnow has 3 speeds and can run in both directions. The speeds are 25, 40 and 55 ml a minute. To go in reverse you would add a - sign in front of the speed you set. My original pumps I was using are in the garage and the tank is 35ft from the garage. The drain that the drain pump empties into is 25ft away so in both cases the tubing is run through the attic and down the walls so that limits the types of pumps I can use. I don't have an actual photo since it is a beta unit and is not mounted and just sitting on my work bench. I will post a photo from the CoralVue website. Now that it has been released I will see if I can make a mount but it will require some more woodwork to do. Below is a photo.

Ok now I will get into setting this up. The first two screens are the two output setups one for the fill pump and one for the drain pump. The output type is set to smart doser. The output device in the fill pump output is set to doser 2 on the Minnow. The output device on the drain pump is set to doser 1 on the minnow. It does not matter which is which though since the pumps are the same other than color of the pump head. I have the default flow rate set to 55 ml a minute for this use. Since I am not using a reservoir I need the output to keep track of the notify when reservoir below is set to 0 so no alert or output tile will not turn red. All doser on the hydros calibrate the same. You would need to run it using a manual dose until the tubing and pump are completely full of liquid, Then you would click calibrate I usually do that after everything is setup and ready to go though. I will get into that in a later post.

Now on to the schedule for the water change. Since these are smart doser they will not work in the auto water change regimen that is currently in the Hydros. But you can still do it by using a dosing schedule. So the schedule type is dosing regimen. Dynamic dosing is turned off for now, but if I get a nitrate input I can use with this I will setup dynamic dosing that will change the amount of the water change based on the nitrate level. That will be a plus for doing the water change this way. The most I have done this way so far is 5500ml a day which is about 1.2 gallons a day but my tank is a 42 gallon tank.The dose count is set to 4 so the 5500ml are spread out to 4 times a day. That keeps the run time down on the pumps per instance and it is also timed to happen between my auto alkalinity testing and the dosing that is done so there is an alkalinity test, then a water change, then a All For Reef dose and then a KH buffer dose. So the 4 times a day fits in with my alkalinity testing and dosing schedule. The doser count is set to two since this will be controlling the drain and fill pump. The first doser to run is doser 1 and that is set to the drain output with a speed of 55ml a minute. Here is where I would set it to -55ml if I wanted it to run in reverse for this schedule. Also I could change the speed from either 25, 40 or 55. The only thing is it is best if at all possible to to run at the speed calibrated at which would be the speed set in the output settings. Doser 2 is set to the fill pump output. It is set to the same speed as doser 1 for this use and it is the same type pump. The next setting is the delay between when the current doser stops and the start of the next doser. In this case I don't want a delay so it is set to 0. There is still a small delay of a few seconds between the stopping of the drain pump and the start of the fill pump but that is ok since I do have a minimum off time set on my ATO and that counter will not start until the depends on used to halt the ATO is released. I don't have the active in modes showing but this is active in all but the low power and water change mode. This schedule dose not place the controller in the water change mode and the only way on my system is if I manually place it in that mode so if it is in that mode then I don't want this schedule to run. The same with low power mode since it is only in that mode normally whan there is a power outage and the controller is running on batteries. I don't want it to run a a water change in that case. The start time is 2 am and that is between the 1 am test and the 3 am All For reef and the 3:30 am KH buffer dosing. The end time is set to 2 am so the schedule runs a complete 24 hours. Run ever N days is set to one since I want it to run every day. Also all the days of the week are selected since I do want it to run on all days of the week. The depends on setting is set to the AWC Halt output with a dependency mode of off if on. I have the AWC Halt output setup to come on if a switch on one of the button boxes is on. This will prevent the schedule from running. So if I want to halt the water changes for a few days all I have to do is press that switch to turn it on. It s located at my mixing station in the garage. That switch will also disable all the other switches on the button boxes in the garage also. So if I go out of town for a long weekend I can press that switch and will halt the water changes and also prevent the dispense buttons that are out there from activating. That is it for the schedule. Now on to the ATO OK output used to halt the ATO.

Below is the ATO halt output. It is named ATO OK and when on that means it is ok to run the ATO as needed. When off then keep the ATO off. This output is a combiner output type since it uses other outputs as inputs. Input count is set to 2 since this will have 2 inputs the drain pump output and the fill pump output. Input one is the drain pump. Invert input is on. That makes the input active if the actual output is off which in this case we want it active if the pumps are off. Input 2 is the fill pump and it is setup the same as input one. The combiner mode is AND since we want the output active only when but outputs used as inputs are off. There is no output device since this output is only used for logic. If input dependency unavailable then turn on. If either of the two pump output become unavailable we want the output to stay on so the ATO will still run when needed. Next I will post screenshots of my ATO so you can see how it gets halted by this output. I had to split this into two post so this is continued on the next post,

 

[n2585722]

Continued from previous post. Now on to the ATO with the screenshots below. Sorry it took 3 screenshots to get all of it but it is a complex output since there are 5 inputs used to control it. I use the generic output type for this but I did change the icon to the ATO icon by clicking on the pen in the upper left. It comes up with a popup and if you click on the icon in the popup it takes you to s screen where you can choose the icon you want for the output being edited. The input count is set to 5. Input one is the sump level input. This is the one used for the top off control. It is set to active when dry since we want the output on when dry and the other inputs are active also. Input 2 is the leak detector in the stand. All leaks are funneled to the bottom of the stand where the sump and leak detector are at. This is also set to active when dry. If it is wet then there is a leak and we do not want to add more water if there is a leak. Input 3 is leak RODI and it is also set to active when dry. The reason for this one is it is on the floor of the garage where the ATO pump and reservoir is at. If a leak is detected there is no way to know where it is actually coming from but to be safe if it is wet this keeps the ATO from running until it can be checked into. Input 4 is Di reservoir low reading. This one is set to active when wet since I want the ATO to run if there is not a low water level. This sensor will also start the refill of the DI reservoir when it goes dry so this condition should not last too long unless there is an issue like a leak. Input 5 is the sump high input. This is set to active when dry since we want the ATO to run when needed as long as the sump is not in a high level condition. The combiner mode is AND since I want all the inputs in their active state for the output to come on. Has schedule is off since there is no schedule for top offs to happen. They happen as needed. The output device is the port that my ATO is connected to in the garage. The power safe range is the normal range that the pump will draw when the output is on. I do not currently have it set to send an alert if it gets out of range but I can set it to either none, yellow, orange or red alert level. If input dependency unavailable is set to off since if any of the inputs are not available then I don't want the top off to occur. On this output active in modes is active in all modes except for water change sine if I was doing a manual water change I defiantly don't want the top off to occur. Now we are to the part where the ATO OK output is used to halt the ATO. The depends on setting is set to the ATO OK output and the dependency mode is set to off if off so if the ATO OK output is off the top off will not occur. This prevents the ATO from topping off when either the drain or fill pump outputs are on. Invisible is set to off since this is not an output ai want to be invisible. Enable advanced settings is turn on so I could set minimum and maximum settings. Since I use a pump that has only a 43ml a minute flow rate some of time will seem high to someone using the Hydros ATO pump. There are set to a particular tanks needs anyway so they will be different on each tank. I have a minimum off time set to 5 minutes. Under normal circumstances that time counter starts as soon as the output turns off. The exception is if a depends on is active and has the output forced off. Then the counter will start when the depends on has been released. So in the case of the ATO OK halting the output the counter would star as soon as the fill pump turns off so it will take at least 5 minutes after the water change completes before a top off would occur. The next setting maximum off time is set to 6 hours. If there is no top off done in 6 hours then something is wrong with my tank. This setting will not turn on the output and will only send an alert if it is set to do so. The next setting minimum on time is set to 35 seconds so the output will stay on at least that long once it turns on regardless of the inputs used to control it other than depends on settings. Those have priority over all actions. The next setting maximum on time I have set to 3 minutes. This depends on the next setting as to what happens other than an alert if that is setup. That setting is run past max on time. I have it set to off so once it get to maximum on time the output will turn off and send an alert if set to do so. It will stay off until one of the input settings becomes inactive which would normally turn off the output or you intervene using the overrides cycling it to on or off and back to auto. The next setting is the notification level for the advanced settings setting. This is set to the orange level. So this setting will generate an orange level alert of maximum off time or maximum on time is exceed or met. So as long as you have a device with the app with you with internet access and the wifi and internet is work that the controllers are hooked to then you would get a push notification for this. It will also send one if the cloud looses contact with any of the controllers for period of time. I think that is something like 5 minutes but not exactly sure. That is about it for this post. I can get into the calibration on another post.

 

[gastone]

Beautiful job. I kept a 42 hex until about 16 years ago when I got out of the hobby for a spell. Built an oversized hood to accommodate a 250w radium, 2-24" vho actinics and 2-t5 blue+. Was a fun, unusually tank that gave me fits. Had a seam that leaked regularly and I never addressed properly. So every few months if spring another leak.

Just a stunning job!

 

[n2585722]

Beautiful job. I kept a 42 hex until about 16 years ago when I got out of the hobby for a spell. Built an oversized hood to accommodate a 250w radium, 2-24" vho actinics and 2-t5 blue+. Was a fun, unusually tank that gave me fits. Had a seam that leaked regularly and I never addressed properly. So every few months if spring another leak.

Just a stunning job!

Thank you, I have had the tank since the early 80's and set it up again after building my own canopy and stand. I did have to reseal the tank on the inside. I remove the old silicone RTV from the inside and used silicone RTV that I ordered. It started leaking where the glass sides come together and not at the top or bottom. So far I have not had any more leaks and lucky it happened before I got it setup and running. I am very happy with how it turned out.