Xp aqua sumpless ato

[Lukeluke]

Hey all. Is anyone running the xp aqua sumpless ato on a rimmed tank? I'm hoping it is capable of keeping the water line above the bottom of the rim. Less for aestheics, and more about the HOB filter getting crazy noisy when the water level gets to low. It would be no more than 1.25" from the lid support part of the rim. Thanks!

 

[Lukeluke]

Bump before it leaves the front page.

 

[Lukeluke]

Thought I'd post this for anyone searching later.

So I decided to try it out. So far it's keeping about the level I want. Just below the output of the HOB filter. Don't get that non-stop waterfall noise. It's right at the edge of the trim on the outside though. It wouldn't go any higher without trimming the... uh... trim.

This is how I set it up on my 75g rimmed tank. It took some thinking figuring out how to install it, but this worked for me.

Turn all the tank equipment off to start.

1. Assembly actually wasn't a big deal. It will only go together one way. If one of the plugs into the controller doesn't fit, switch spots with the other one. Other than that, included instructions do their job.

2. Install the box in the tank at the highest possible point. It will fill up, and if the tank is at a similar level to mine, it will fill quite a ways over the overflow sensor. So...

3. Drain the tank to a level just below the bottom sensor. It will also be below the bottom of the skimmer slots. KEEP THE WATER! Ideally the container used to drain the tank should be the same container you're planning on using as the ATO reservoir.

4. Drop the ATO pump into the reservoir of salt water.

5. Plug everything in.

6. The ATO pump will flip on and off as the skimmer box fills and is pumped out into the tank. The skimmer pump will drain the box slower than it fills, so it will repeatedly fill to the overflow sensor and stop untll the water is pumped out of the box and below the low level sensor again.

7. The ATO pump will finally turn off for a while once the tank level and the box level balance out. It will probably take pretty close to all the water you drained earlier.

8. Either dump that last bit of saltwater and refill with fresh, or, as I did, just add the fresh onto whatever salt is left. It was a small enough amount in my case it shouldn't have too big an impact on the DT salinity. But I'll test in the morning and see where it's at.

9. Realize you'll probably have to rearrange the equipment hanging on the tank because you didn't really take your time to plan exactly where everything should go and just threw it on where it would fit.

10. Aaaaand done!

There might be a better way, but this worked out well for me. Hope it helps!

 

[ccn0210]

I just installed this on a rimmed 75g yesterday. I'm dealing with the water line over the sensor as you mentioned in bullet #2. I appreciate your solution and will try it out tomorrow. Thanks!

Chris

 

[Lukeluke]

Great! Hope it works out.

 

[ccn0210]

Worked great. Thanks!

 

[Craig77]

Hey was curious how you like the performance of this top off unit with a rimmed tank so far? Any issues? I was thinking of potentially using this on a 20G breeder rimmed tank that I use for QT to help me do a better job maintaining salinity (which I do manually now). Thanks for posting to share the experience!

 

[Lukeluke]

Hey was curious how you like the performance of this top off unit with a rimmed tank so far? Any issues? I was thinking of potentially using this on a 20G breeder rimmed tank that I use for QT to help me do a better job maintaining salinity (which I do manually now). Thanks for posting to share the experience!

I ended up making a slight modification to get the water level up a little higher. Just super-glued a few pieces of acrylic over the bottom of the skimmer slots to make them shorter.

I also ended up not replacing the block of whatever it is/does that came with it. Didn't seem critical. However, snails are now able to make their way into the impeller on the pump and stop it. Might have to stuff some filter floss in there to stop that from happening again.

Other than that, seems to work fine.