Gravity water feed for sulphur denitrator/calcium reactor.

[Jon_W79]

This is a gravity water feed I made for my sulphur denitrator. I believe the water flow it will provide will be very consistent (a lot more consistent than coming directly from a centrifugal pump). The gravity water feed is made using a DI filter housing. The water comes from a water pump in the sump, goes through a gate valve that I have all the way open, goes through a filter that came with the sulphur denitrator, then the water goes up to the gravity water feed siting on the aquarium overflow.

The water enters the gravity water feed through the tubing on the right. The tubing that comes out of the top left is for excess water( you always want a least some water coming out of it). The tubing that comes out of bottom left goes to the control valve that came with the sulphur denitrator under the aquarium. And then the water goes into the sulphur denitrator.

 

[Jon_W79]

For the most consistent water flow I would recommend that the water flow coming out of the bottom left tubing be the same or have more flow than the top left tubing(this is a lot more beneficial for final or long term adjustments). If the top left tubing has water coming out fast and is a lot faster than the bottom left tubing, this could create pressure in the gravity water feed, and the water coming out of bottom left tubing wouldn't be flowing only because of a siphon, but also because of pressure.

I think the gravity water feed should be thought of as almost like a mini aquarium with a Herbie overflow drain connected to a sulphur denitrator or calcium reactor. For a combination of cost and consistent water flow I think this will be the best way to provide water flow for a sulphur denitrator or calcium reactor. I would like to here what people think about this(critiques, questions, etc). If someone doesn't think this will be the best when it comes to cost and consistent water flow, I would like to hear why.

 

[Jon_W79]

I'll give updates on how the gravity water feed is working. It has been only one day, but I'm very optimistic so far.

 

[Jon_W79]

I noticed that other people have used a siphon to feed a calcium reactor, but they didn't use a filter(what I saw). And flow droped over time(tubing and control valve got dirty). What I made uses a filter. If I have a good filter on the gravity water feed, the water flow should be very consistent for a long time.

 

[ca1ore]

Not sure I really see why a gravity feed would be any more consistent than a pump feed. Putting a filter on the input may well help. My original CaRX (MTC ProCal) had a prefilter, but they did away with in in later iterations .... not sure why.

 

[Jon_W79]

I think you could put a lot better filter on the gravity water feed, because it's ok to lose water flow if you have enough excess. You could possibly even put a RO/DI 5 micron sediment filter on it. If you had a pre filter before the sediment filter I think it might work well(running filter socks on aquarium would help). If you use a 5 micron sediment filter I think the gravity feed will have a lot more consistent flow than a pump feed. Gravity should change a lot less than pump performance and a 5 micron sediment filter should keep the gravity feed pretty clean(I believe it would stay a lot cleaner than a pump feed with a filter).