Will a dosing pump pull from my basement?

[MiniBukta]

I couldn’t find any clear answers on this, so I figured I’d ask. I wanna set up my BM dosing pump as an auto water change, does anyone know if it will pull from my basement to the first floor? About 20’ of tubing would be required over a 10 foot lift.

 

[Darren in Tacoma]

That is getting close to the limit on these types of pumps. I would suggest using the smallest diameter tubing available, 3/16 id would probably work. I have seen 1/8 id tubing on these but it is pretty fragile.

 

[Shirak]

10' of lift should be no problem for a peristaltic pump.

 

[Brett S]

Those peristaltic pumps are usually pretty strong. I know that the Neptune DOS is rated for up to 24 feet of lift. I would not go with any smaller diameter tube though. I don’t think it will make a difference in terms of the pump’s ability to push water up and it will probably be easier to clog. My water mixing and storage station is in my garage and I have a DOS pump that pushes water up into my attic, across the attic floor, then down through the wall into my living room tank. About once a year my 1/4 inch NSW line seems to get clogged with calcium deposits, although I recently switched to a polyethylene tube instead of a vinyl tube and that one seems to be more clog resistant.

Oddly my OSW line has never gotten clogged and that’s an even longer run as it goes from the tank, up inside the wall into the attic, down into the garage to the DOS, then back up into the attic and over to the laundry room, then down inside the wall to the laundry drain.

 

[Shirak]

I also use 1/4" polyethylene on my ato, CaRx and DOS auto water change which are all located in the basement across the house. These all run on peristaltic pumps and have no issues.

 

[MiniBukta]

Awesome, thank you all for the replies, now it’s time to plan!

 

[Water Dog]

What model doser are you using? The reason I ask is that both the BM-T01 and BM-T11 dosers have a max dosing rate of 1999ml. That’s about a half gallon per day with the doser running at max.

 

[Darren in Tacoma]

As the pump is used over a period of time the squeeze tube begins to wear out. It flattens and reduces the amount of product dispensed. The more product it has to move, the faster it wears out, thus the practice of using smaller diameter intake tubing. A peri-pump with larger and longer intake tubing drops off faster. Much of this is dependent on the size and material of the squeeze tube, and its compatibility with the product being pumped. Your pump will accurately dose for a longer period of time in this fashion. You should not have any clogs unless air gets in the line and product crystalizes or the same pump is used with incompatible products. This should not be a problem with saltwater.

 

[Billldg]

Pull, likely not, push, good possibility. As far as Dos, not really sure either way, for the Versa, I know it can push a lot as videos have been done on it.

 

[Christopher1492]

As the pump is used over a period of time the squeeze tube begins to wear out. It flattens and reduces the amount of product dispensed. The more product it has to move, the faster it wears out, thus the practice of using smaller diameter intake tubing. A peri-pump with larger and longer intake tubing drops off faster. Much of this is dependent on the size and material of the squeeze tube, and its compatibility with the product being pumped. Your pump will accurately dose for a longer period of time in this fashion. You should not have any clogs unless air gets in the line and product crystalizes or the same pump is used with incompatible products. This should not be a problem with saltwater.

So sorry to resurrect an old thread, but… can you please explain the idea that using smaller diameter (the size the pump typically uses) tubing for these peristalic pumps for long distance runs is better than upsizing tubing to a larger diameter? I will be running 10 feet vertical and 65 feet horizontal for AWC and I assumed, as with typical plumbing, that upsizing the discharge side would create less back pressure on the pump. I will likely be using the Versa dosing pump for this. I believe it uses 1/4” tubing and I was considering upsizing to 3/8” or 1/4” tubing.
Thank you!

 

[Shirak]

So sorry to resurrect an old thread, but… can you please explain the idea that using smaller diameter (the size the pump typically uses) tubing for these peristalic pumps for long distance runs is better than upsizing tubing to a larger diameter? I will be running 10 feet vertical and 65 feet horizontal for AWC and I assumed, as with typical plumbing, that upsizing the discharge side would create less back pressure on the pump. I will likely be using the Versa dosing pump for this. I believe it uses 1/4” tubing and I was considering upsizing to 3/8” or 1/4” tubing.
Thank you

I would keep the tubing the same diameter as the tubing in the pump. Keep it simple and not have to worry about various adapters. There isn't an issue for back pressure or head pressure for the flow rate and run you are doing between 1/4" or 3/8". If you are doing AWC with water in on head and water out on another you will calibrate flow once it's set up anyway.

 

[Christopher1492]

OK, so no head pressure or back pressure so changing size of tubing yields no real benefit other than adding more complexity…which I’m really good at doing :)
Thanks!

(BTW meant to say upsizing to 3/8” or 1/2” not 1/4” in the last sentence in my original post above.)