Most Accurate Continuous Dosers - for Auto Water Changes - Your Ideas and Suggestions

[Adamantium]

I use RO tubing but I had to use the barb fittings from my DP1's the barb fittings are a little small for the RO tubing. It comes with two sizes of tubing. The larger size is what is installed in the pump head. I also have sump low and sump overfull sensors just in case I have one pump fail for some reason. I run them for 15 minutes at a time three times a day. They are set for around 60ml per minute. What I did was calibrate the fill pump for 60ml. To calibrate the drain pump Iset them up for normal use but had the fill going to quart size cup and the drain pump removing from the cup. The cup was at the sump. It was about 1/2 full. I had a scale to measure the water before and after. I adjusted the drain pump so that it had the same weight after as before. It took a few tries to get it close enough to satisfy me.

Much appreciated. Thankfully, I have some extra DP4 heads that should work for that.

Can you tell me how loud they are? These will be right under my stand, so I’d like to have the quietest pumps possible, but I realize there will always be some noise.

 

[n2585722]

Much appreciated. Thankfully, I have some extra DP4 heads that should work for that.

Can you tell me how loud they are? These will be right under my stand, so I’d like to have the quietest pumps possible, but I realize there will always be some noise.

Mine are in the garage so I don't normally hear them at all. You can hear them when you are in the garage but they are quiter than the DP1's I was using. Someone that didn't know they were there would not notice the sound over the freezer that is out there when it is running.

 

[Adamantium]

Mine are in the garage so I don't normally hear them at all. You can hear them when you are in the garage but they are quiter than the DP1's I was using. Someone that didn't know they were there would not notice the sound over the freezer that is out there when it is running.

Thanks so much. I really appreciate it. I think I’ll give these a try.

 

[BZOFIQ]

Stenner dual head here.

They are great - if you like noisy stuff.

 

[BZOFIQ]

Posting another update on the BRS dosing pumps, 50ml / minute version. So far, 2 months of success running these.

The coral are looking better and better, benefiting from the increased stability. Specific gravity remains stable at 1.025.

Given the flexibility of the daily water change, I now feel comfortable switching from the red sea to coral pro salt, which should save me a little bit of cash in weekly trace and alk/cal requirements.

I no longer feel the need to wait for the Versa's to come available, which is nice. Instead, I am going to invest in a couple more BRS pumps, for the frag system and backups.

Please post if you are using these, any other pumps mentioned or something else. I think it's important to share our experience, given what is currently available and affordable.

I feel these might be good for a small setup because they can change about a gallon an hour. If one needs to change 10-20 gallons I dont think these will last very long.

 

[Roli's Reef Ranch]

Posting another update on the BRS dosing pumps, 50ml / minute version. So far, 2 months of success running these.

The coral are looking better and better, benefiting from the increased stability. Specific gravity remains stable at 1.025.

Given the flexibility of the daily water change, I now feel comfortable switching from the red sea to coral pro salt, which should save me a little bit of cash in weekly trace and alk/cal requirements.

I no longer feel the need to wait for the Versa's to come available, which is nice. Instead, I am going to invest in a couple more BRS pumps, for the frag system and backups.

Please post if you are using these, any other pumps mentioned or something else. I think it's important to share our experience, given what is currently available and affordable.

I was thinking about doing AWC the same way and searched until I found your post. Wondering if you're still using this system and how it's held up all this time. I want to run it up one floor and 30 feet or so.

 

[mattdg]

The BRS high volume dosers are still doing great, for my daily 1.5 gallon WCs. No problem pulling the water up 8’, though there is a minor volume offset that I am able to manage by mixing my fresh SW to 1.030. Tank is 1.025. Judging by how long my Drew’s Dosers have lasted (10 years!) I predict I will be running these for a long time. I perform alk / cal dosing with the Gen 1 Drews, also a BRS product. The trick is to swap out the silicon tubing at least 1x per year. The motors and rollers are high quality .

 

[mattdg]

I feel these might be good for a small setup because they can change about a gallon an hour. If one needs to change 10-20 gallons I dont think these will last very long.

Maybe true, but most Reefers are changing 1-2 gallons / day anyway, even on relatively large systems.

 

[mattdg]

Update on the BRS High capacity dosers 50ml/minute.

These are working well, for the AWC, but I have had some reliability issues.

The first had a motor failure, within 8 months. BRS was quick to replace that unit. The second doser, from that same order, failed a month ago. It was a little over a year old, moving 1.5 gallons per day. The dosing head stripped, motor still worked.

There is no easy way to replace the heads on the BRS dosers, so BRS replaced that unit as well. Again, BRS customer service was great... so A+ for that. Very happy with the customer service, but disappointed with how wasteful this is, especially given the fact the heads are not replaceable.

On the flip side, I have been running the same two BRS Drew's dosers (1.6 ml / minute) for Alk / Cal for 10 years. They have been two of the most reliable pieces of gear on my reef tank... period. They do have replaceable heads, though I have never had to replace them, only the silicon tubing on a yearly basis. Also, should mention that I run the low flow BRS dosers (same Italian company that builds the high capacity dosers I am using for the AWC system) on my frag system. They have been extremely reliable.

I will be the first to admit, that auto water change systems are extremely hard on dosing pumps. With that said, I am going to resume my search for a reliable, economical solution. Preferably something that is purpose built, and rebuildable.

 

[n2585722]

Update on the BRS High capacity dosers 50ml/minute.

These are working well, for the AWC, but I have had some reliability issues.

The first had a motor failure, within 8 months. BRS was quick to replace that unit. The second doser, from that same order, failed a month ago. It was a little over a year old, moving 1.5 gallons per day. The dosing head stripped, motor still worked.

There is no easy way to replace the heads on the BRS dosers, so BRS replaced that unit as well. Again, BRS customer service was great... so A+ for that. Very happy with the customer service, but disappointed with how wasteful this is, especially given the fact the heads are not replaceable.

On the flip side, I have been running the same two BRS Drew's dosers (1.6 ml / minute) for Alk / Cal for 10 years. They have been two of the most reliable pieces of gear on my reef tank... period. They do have replaceable heads, though I have never had to replace them, only the silicon tubing on a yearly basis. Also, should mention that I run the low flow BRS dosers (same Italian company that builds the high capacity dosers I am using for the AWC system) on my frag system. They have been extremely reliable.

I will be the first to admit, that auto water change systems are extremely hard on dosing pumps. With that said, I am going to resume my search for a reliable, economical solution. Preferably something that is purpose built, and rebuildable.

I have used Intllab dosing pumps for this. They do have a speed pot so you can change the flow rate to match each other if needed. I don't think they would be any more or less reliable bur they are only about $27 each and you can get another motor with a nee head for around $10. I have had to change one motor and the tubing but that is about it. I have been using the for 1 1/2 years. I even went as far as modifying one to a dual head dosing pump. That is the one I now use for AWC. I got a Hydros dosing pump that I am trying as my ATO. I did have two spare pumps but after getting the Hydros I now have three spares so zi now have one of them modified as a dual head. The top three are spares. That location is for a tank that I don't currently have setup. I only change a little less than a gallon a day normally on my tank with the AWC. It is just a 42 gallon tank.

 

[Sean Clark]

My auto water changer is 10 years old. Pretty reliable, can be a little high maintenance and she does have her fair share of break downs once in a while but I have not had to replace any parts yet.

 

[mattdg]

I have used Intllab dosing pumps for this. They do have a speed pot so you can change the flow rate to match each other if needed. I don't think they would be any more or less reliable bur they are only about $27 each and you can get another motor with a nee head for around $10. I have had to change one motor and the tubing but that is about it. I have been using the for 1 1/2 years. I even went as far as modifying one to a dual head dosing pump. That is the one I now use for AWC. I got a Hydros dosing pump that I am trying as my ATO. I did have two spare pumps but after getting the Hydros I now have three spares so zi now have one of them modified as a dual head. The top three are spares. That location is for a tank that I don't currently have setup. I only change a little less than a gallon a day normally on my tank with the AWC. It is just a 42 gallon tank.

Interesting. I like your setup. It has a very professional look, with a sort of clinical / medical lab vibe. Very nice.

So how hard was it to dial the two dosers in / get them to match? Seems like if one got bumped or something, it might throw off the calibration.

I do like that you can stack the heads. Where did you find the double head to do that and is it reliable in this configuration? What kind of head pressure are you running these at? My new SW bin is 8' under my display tank. Think they could handle that?

Have you had any issues with back siphoning, when your pumps are off?

Do you know what the min / max throughput is, turned all the way down / up? How easy is it to find the replacement parts, Head and Motor? Where did you purchase yours?

Sorry for all the questions and thanks in advance.

 

[n2585722]

I got them on Amazon and the motor and heads are available as well. to add two pump heads I had to use a motor with a longer shaft. It came with the pump heads on Amazon also. I have them in the garage and the tank is in a room 35ft from the garage. I have the tubing run through PVC conduit up through the attic and down inside the wall to a box with a wall plate. Then ran tubing from there to the sump. The drain side goes back up through the attic to the kitchen sink drain. All of the pumps are in the garage. I placed a container at the sump and placed both the drain tubing and the fill tubing in it with a known volume it the container. I ran both pumps simultaneously for a given amount of time and rechecked the liquid level. I adjusted one of the pumps flow rate up or down until I had no difference in the level. I would adjust one pump for the flow rate I wanted before doing this and would adjust the other pump to match. So far with the dual pump heads I don't need to adjust the two pumps since there is only one pump but I do check them. I have some photos of replacing the motor with the one for two heads in my build thread in post #141. It show a flow rate of 5-100ml per minute but I am not sure if it will reliably go that low. I do have one set to 12ml per minute. It uses a different size tubing to do that. It comes with the larger size installed but has the smaller size also. I don't have any siphoning issues. It would probably be from the storage tank to the display tank if I did since it is usually a higher level than what is in the sump. I have check valves in the lines. Originally it was only in the drain line at the sink drain but when I started using the dual heads I added one to the fill pump as well. That was just to make sure they had about the same load on them. I also have them on the ATO pump output and the All For Reef dosing pump since they both share the same line through the attic to the sump. I have switched controllers since I started using the pumps and that controller has a auto water change task built in that would control the drain pump, fill pump and the ATO as part of the water change. I may go back to two pumps and use that and try it. I have the extra pump and an extra drive port for the extra pump to try it with. I would have to check and make sure it would not take too much out of the tank for the return pump each time it drains as they run at separate times on the built in AWC task.

Here is a link to the dosing pump

 

[mattdg]

I got them on Amazon and the motor and heads are available as well. to add two pump heads I had to use a motor with a longer shaft. It came with the pump heads on Amazon also. I have them in the garage and the tank is in a room 35ft from the garage. I have the tubing run through PVC conduit up through the attic and down inside the wall to a box with a wall plate. Then ran tubing from there to the sump. The drain side goes back up through the attic to the kitchen sink drain. All of the pumps are in the garage. I placed a container at the sump and placed both the drain tubing and the fill tubing in it with a known volume it the container. I ran both pumps simultaneously for a given amount of time and rechecked the liquid level. I adjusted one of the pumps flow rate up or down until I had no difference in the level. I would adjust one pump for the flow rate I wanted before doing this and would adjust the other pump to match. So far with the dual pump heads I don't need to adjust the two pumps since there is only one pump but I do check them. I have some photos of replacing the motor with the one for two heads in my build thread in post #141. It show a flow rate of 5-100ml per minute but I am not sure if it will reliably go that low. I do have one set to 12ml per minute. It uses a different size tubing to do that. It comes with the larger size installed but has the smaller size also. I don't have any siphoning issues. It would probably be from the storage tank to the display tank if I did since it is usually a higher level than what is in the sump. I have check valves in the lines. Originally it was only in the drain line at the sink drain but when I started using the dual heads I added one to the fill pump as well. That was just to make sure they had about the same load on them. I also have them on the ATO pump output and the All For Reef dosing pump since they both share the same line through the attic to the sump. I have switched controllers since I started using the pumps and that controller has a auto water change task built in that would control the drain pump, fill pump and the ATO as part of the water change. I may go back to two pumps and use that and try it. I have the extra pump and an extra drive port for the extra pump to try it with. I would have to check and make sure it would not take too much out of the tank for the return pump each time it drains as they run at separate times on the built in AWC task.

Here is a link to the dosing pump

This is great info. Thank you for taking the time to reply. I found the parts number to the double modded head, in your build thread. Grothen Model G328D. In depth DIY, awesome. I may go ahead and order these parts, so at the very least I have a backup if / when one of the BRS dosers stop working again. Much appreciated.