Reliable doser

[Tham121988]

I am looking for recommendations for a doser 3 bin for the triton core7. I would like something reliable but budget friendly if possible. Thanks!

 

[porterreef]

In the same boat. Tagging along to see what everyone has to say.

 

[landlubber]

I am looking for recommendations for a doser 3 bin for the triton core7. I would like something reliable but budget friendly if possible. Thanks!

reliability and budged friendly are rarely in the same sentence.
i've personally never used one but i'm pretty sure that jebao has a stand-alone 4 head dosing pump that would be very cost friendly... but at the risk of reliability being an issue. bubble magus also makes a decent doser that would probably cost a little more than the jebao but add a little more quality.
the corals and fish in my tank far surpass what most dosers are worth so i bit the bullet and just bought 2 apex DOS pumps and paid to have a little more peace of mind.
the only other direction i would have went if i didn't have an apex would have been a GHL.

 

[bdejong1112o]

+1 for the Apex solution. I am building my tank now and Apex, Triton and the Apex DOS are all requirements. In this for the long haul.

 

[BigJohnny]

what do you consider budget friendly? IME there is a pretty sizeable gap between the budget options and the high end options.

1. jebao dp-4 (4 head doser, for about $67). Its chinese, some people use them with no issues, others have failures.
2. Bubble Magnus BM-T01 (3 head doser for about $269.99) again chinese but definitely more reliable than the jebao overall. some people still have failures with them.
3. Pacific Sun Kore 5th Starter (5 head doser, for $369.99) european (some parts may be manufactured in asia, not sure), nicer and more reliable than the bubble magus. get 5 heads, can be upgraded to include ATO, temp sensor, optical sensors. Can also buy that included in the package for 429
4. GHL 2.1 doser (super nice, german) $459.99 4 head doser. Best available in my opinion. I think you can also get a 3 head version for 399.

I wouldnt trust the jebao dp-4 to dose alkalinity since it could crash your tank if it failed.
bubble magus is the cheapest i would use but i would test it pretty thoroughly first.
I think pacific sun kore 5th starter is the sweet spot in my opinion, however for close to the same price you can get the nicer (probably) ghl 3 head for 399.

If you have a controller, i would consider 3 brs dosing pumps the best blend of budget and reliability available.

 

[RyanCSGO]

I use the Jebao for alk, cal and mag.
no issues. The set up takes a bit more as each doing point has to be manually set.
FishofHex has been using the Jebao for a pretty long time without issue also. He has a great set up/calibration video for it as well

 

[porterreef]

reliability and budged friendly are rarely in the same sentence.
i've personally never used one but i'm pretty sure that jebao has a stand-alone 4 head dosing pump that would be very cost friendly... but at the risk of reliability being an issue. bubble magus also makes a decent doser that would probably cost a little more than the jebao but add a little more quality.
the corals and fish in my tank far surpass what most dosers are worth so i bit the bullet and just bought 2 apex DOS pumps and paid to have a little more peace of mind.
the only other direction i would have went if i didn't have an apex would have been a GHL.

You are 100% right I bought the jebao doser when I first started and it always made me wonder if it was really dosing or it was just sitting around doing nothing. I even added "peaks" in the dosing so I could look at my fusion graph and see a spike in pH at the times I programmed the jebao to dose alk at night. Needless to say I will be biting the bullet and ordering a DOS this weekend during the BRS group buy while I order some other stuff.

 

[smokin'reefer]

If you are looking for a budget pump, and are a medical student I will throw the plum xl-3 into your consideration.

This is an IV dosing pump that has been discontinued and you can usually pick one up for about $100 on eBay.

I got one after seeing a lot of people using them with no problems. I believe twiller uses one dosing peroxide and other base elements.

The ones I got at worked fine for a while. Two or three months. But when the weather warmed up I kept getting air in line and inclusion errors. Mainly on the alkalinity I was dosing. I dos Red Sea and mix the powder form. I don't know whether that had anything to do with it. Most other people seem to say that they were using the bionic and had no issues.

I actually sent mine to a medical supply repair company in Ohio and had them refurbished. Because I really like the idea of these when they have a malfunction they stop dosing. No post on our two are about a major alkalinity or calcium dump in my tank. Big plus. Slow drip drip drip throughout the day. Another big plus.

You might be able to find a unit being that you are in the medical field pretty reasonably. If you decide to go this route and don't want to chance one on eBay, I will gladly give you one of mine to try. Even though they cost almost $300 to refurbish and put into patient ready condition, I would sell it to you for $100 that I originally bought it.

As you can see, they are kind of bulky. That's one drawback. They use their little cartridges that you might be familiar with. Because the membranes are kind of small is recommended not to Dos anything harsh like no nopox.

 

[solitude127]

@Tham121988 do you have a controller already? If so, why not purchase single dosers like Drew's doser or BRS doser

 

[AdamNC]

BRS 1.1ml dosers and an Apex.

 

[ciscomania]

ghl hands down if money isn't a problem. They just simply work and looks pretty dang sexy.
apex dos I would never get since it only has 2 pumps and they take up too much real estate. Way overpriced for 2 head doser.
I'm pretty sure there are budget friendly dosers that work well but I've never tried them so I can't comment on them. I've have friends that love them and swear by them and friends that hate them for failing and leading to tank crash.

 

[SPR1968]

Ive been using the Kamoer 4 channel doser for well over a year.

Very reliable and easy to use but not the cheapest

 

[Ranjib]

reliability and budged friendly are rarely in the same sentence.
i've personally never used one but i'm pretty sure that jebao has a stand-alone 4 head dosing pump that would be very cost friendly... but at the risk of reliability being an issue. bubble magus also makes a decent doser that would probably cost a little more than the jebao but add a little more quality.
the corals and fish in my tank far surpass what most dosers are worth so i bit the bullet and just bought 2 apex DOS pumps and paid to have a little more peace of mind.
the only other direction i would have went if i didn't have an apex would have been a GHL.

Dont mean to distract this thread, but what kind of additional reliability apex provides that jebao does not. From purely systems perspective jebao should be more reliable, as it is not doing anything else, hence it is not prone to any other failures from any other component. A full blown controller like apex and GHL should have more moving parts or will be dependent on network / some other connectivity. Is it that they can be configured to abort if ph or some other sensor based parameter goes off the chart ?

 

[landlubber]

Dont mean to distract this thread, but what kind of additional reliability apex provides that jebao does not. From purely systems perspective jebao should be more reliable, as it is not doing anything else, hence it is not prone to any other failures from any other component. A full blown controller like apex and GHL should have more moving parts or will be dependent on network / some other connectivity. Is it that they can be configured to abort if ph or some other sensor based parameter goes off the chart ?

the only moving parts in a doser are the pump heads themselves regardless of whether you are using a standalone doser or a slave. in jebao's case they are cheap chinese pumps resulting in a product more prone to failure. they don't all fail catastrophically but in a SPS tank it's a piece of equipment i don't feel like gambling with.
yes i need a network to change settings on my apex but they are not dependent on one to operate and the DOS will happily follow the program settings.
both GHL and Apex have alkalinity testing and intervention devices coming out right away that tie into the controllers and in the case of GHL's 2.1 this can be added using just the programmable doser and does not even require the controller. interesting devices.

 

[reefwiser]

I have 3 GHL dosers they are used for all kind of task's from ATO to Balling to trace element dosing and soon to test Alk. Small quite and easy to setup and use. They use stepper motors instead of DC motors and have excellent tech support. An they have great resale valve if you ever want to sell them.

 

[RobertP]

I went cheap and got the jaebo 4 head doser for around $70. I also got the idea from FishofHex and have to say it has been reliable. Yeah the menu is kind of a pain but it works and can't argue the price. At some point I will probably get a Wifi version GHL or a nicer doser because I have nightmares about the pumps staying on!!! I wanted to get the Neptune as well but only 2 heads for $300 just didnt make sense to me.

 

[Walts O]

Aqua medic evo reefdoser 4 dosing heads and you can add a slave doser for an additional 4 heads and the programming module is on a wire so makes it easier to program

 

[jhatfield]

Went with the jaebo 4 which has been running 8 months and so far no issues. This thing is basic and functional. I'd much prefer a wifi setup with sturdier construction but when researching didn't find many (if any) instances of pumps getting stuck in the ON position which it the nightmare scenario.

I did read that there were issues with accuracy with very small dosages, like 1 mil/day, but haven't run across that myself. This is where a doser with stepper motors would be a must.

 

[RobertP]

Read several reviews on BRS site of the Bubblemagnus getting stuck in the on position and assumed that was a common problem. Hope it is just isolated to those.

 

[MtrSkllz]

I use the kamoer x4, I have had it for about 3 months and tested it twice and it was perfect. Using your phone to make adjustments is really easy, and the containers they have are great for me and have level sensors.