Durand tank build (1 Viewer)

[Varig]

That's fantastic to hear Shawn, you'll get there. Regarding the probes, I have the same annoyance with my sump. Maybe if I ran the sump level at the absolute minimum the probes would be above the waterline, but that messes with the level I need for my skimmer...alas. I just have a secondary probe holder and the built in ones are totally useless.

One of the 3D printed parts of my Avast was bad from the "factory," so the circulation pump won't clip into it. So I have still haven't installed it yet, but Justin was an absolute legend on the customer service. He immediately offered to send me a new one, free of charge, which should be here tomorrow. So hopefully soon I'll also be running a sweet in sump auto feeder

 

[Fishfoo]

For anyone still following along, the avast plank is working very well in the sump. I did add that small nano power head to keep things moving and because I was getting some film on top of the water but the power head is doing dual duties. I see just a very tiny amount of left over food today, and when I did my water change last Sunday there was a small amount of stuff in that chamber but i just sucked it out quick during the water change. If I had my return pump turned up more the power head may not be needed but this seems to be working great.

Interesting. I would’ve thought that the return pump + the always on avast pump would be more than enough agitation. Especially since yours and most other peoples return chambers aren’t all that big

 

[reef junkie]

Interesting. I would’ve thought that the return pump + the always on avast pump would be more than enough agitation. Especially since yours and most other peoples return chambers aren’t all that big

Without the power head in the return chamber there is zero water agitation. I added a elbow to my skimmer to get the return water from pump to agitate the water in the skimmer area, the power head in the return does what is needed there and the center chamber is still. But the oily film on top runs to the teeth that separate the return and Fuge so nothing sits on top.

The avast pump does mix 24/7 but the agitation is kept to the inside of the feeding tube.

 

[Fishfoo]

Intersting. I was planning on putting my plank in the return chamber as well but was hoping to not add anything else in there as that chamber is already packed with stuff

 

[reef junkie]

If you get enough pull from the return pump you may not need the extra pump.

 

[reef junkie]

Was unsuccessful trying to recalibrate prob in the second location. It just kept failing or would not settle during manual calibration and then failed. So not sure what’s with that. But I did recalibrate again in the first probe location so will see how that settles in after a bit.

 

[reef junkie]

After recalibrating yesterday along with proper water depth on the probe and then a few adjustments to the scrubber happy to say ph is not as bad as I was thinking. I dont know why it’s not higher, but Im not doing anything more about it. LOL. Might grab a different ph probe brand next time i need to replace but this is it for now,

 

[reef junkie]

Last day of vacation so I spent the day playing in the sump……it’s a now or never situation for the next couple of months.

Grabbed 2 marineland 150watt heaters yesterday and installed and added the new programming from @Ben Nicholls into the apex. The built in temp controllers were competing and would not run how I wanted. So took them out and grabbed two 100watt brs titanium’s today. They are just plugged into apex for now, no additional controller. The 100’s might be to small. Topped out at 77.7 won’t get above. Im ok with that temp. But feel if needed I should need them to be able to get higher. Hopefully by morning we’ll be there

Also since I was in the sump all day. I decided to soak skimmer and kalk reactor in vinegar while I had them out of the sump. Put kalk stirrer back online and filled with fresh kalk powder. I was surprised to see where my ph ended up this evening.

Almost seems too good to be true and I need to recalibrate the probe again. Lol.

 

[Fishfoo]

I bet it’s accurate. Fresh batch of kalk in the stirrer will get the ph up in no time. I forget, did you end up making the outlet bigger yet on it?

Something that you probably knew but I just recently found out is that the titanium heaters also double as a ground probe for your tank. Thought that was pretty cool.

 

[reef junkie]

The stirrer came with a 1/2 house for the outlet When I purchased second hand.

Interesting fact on the heaters. Never gave it any thought before. Good to know though.

 

[reef junkie]

One of the heaters ran from midnight to 10:30 no stop at 77.4 degrees until the T5’s kicked on and that extra boost warmed the tank the .5 degrees to reach 77.9 and finally shut off at 12:30 this afternoon. Not have ever done my heating in this way is this good? Or should I be looking to increase the heater size?

at 6 is when the new heaters went live and I was done messing with the heat prob,

 

[Varig]

I’m curious what others will say, but part of me feels like that’s “good” because it’s super consistent. But clearly disconcerting to see it run all day or to question if you have any buffer to catch up (like if you did a water change with room temp water).

Is that with just one heater running at a time? Could you do apex programming that if it got below a certain temp it would turn both on to catch up?

 

[reef junkie]

I’m curious what others will say, but part of me feels like that’s “good” because it’s super consistent. But clearly disconcerting to see it run all day or to question if you have any buffer to catch up (like if you did a water change with room temp water).

Is that with just one heater running at a time? Could you do apex programming that if it got below a certain temp it would turn both on to catch up?

I do heat my WC water the morning of water changes. So no big deal there.

Yes that’s with one heater running.

Apex programming link that @Ben Nicholls attached to your heater sizing thread has just that. I tweaked it a bit as I’m messing with it, but if things get to come the second heater does kick on and both heaters were running when I first turned on.

 

[MistakesWereMade]

Not to derail the conversation, but this is what my graph looks like:

It looks highly erratic until you look at the scale and see all measurements are within 0.4 degree. That is the graph for 7 days.

As far as my heater is concerned, here is the power graph (2 days):

It does appear to run almost non-stop from 12-7am which is when I do my AWC from 12-5am. My AWC water is room temp and dumps in directly where the Apex and controller probes are. Throughout the day it goes to on/off cycles based on my controller (Helio). Apex is just used for monitoring and pushing alarms if temps are outside of range.

I guess my question is, is there a setting on the Apex probe hysteresis? I notice yours seemed to swing +/-2 degrees prior to the code. That doesn't show if the outlet was on/off though, but your comment said it didn't shut off. That might just be the code that you are using. Could change temp value where the heater turns on/off to have a faster/slower hysteresis. That being said, I read that the old Apex energy bars had roughly 100,000 cycles MTBF on the outlet relays. I have not seen that on any official document just other forums and that didn't mention the newer models. Each 'ON' adds a count, each 'OFF' adds a count. Having the apex do the control could really eat away at the life expectancy for that outlet if switching often (>50x/day). I would look up the relays datasheet but could not find the part number in my quick search.

 

[reef junkie]

Appreciate the feed back, if the power cycle have an expiration date. Having these heaters just staying on all day running and only turning off when they switch between the two will extend the life of the eb8. Since yesterday. Heater 1 ran for the 12 hours without turning off, heater two was headed in that direction until I turned the fireplace on. So maybe thats all i need to do, run the fireplace a few hours in the eventing and the heaters can have a short union 15 LOL.

I don't really mind that it runs all day was just more curious if I should be concerned again because I've never ran a system in this way. But not having a secondary heater controller if the heaters cant heat over 77.4 without t5 help in theory they should never be able to boil the tank if they got stuck on. And in the times the tank does get cooler for what ever reason the Apex will tell the backup to turn on to help with any extra lifting needed.

 

[spsick]

One of the heaters ran from midnight to 10:30 no stop at 77.4 degrees until the T5’s kicked on and that extra boost warmed the tank the .5 degrees to reach 77.9 and finally shut off at 12:30 this afternoon. Not have ever done my heating in this way is this good? Or should I be looking to increase the heater size?

at 6 is when the new heaters went live and I was done messing with the heat prob,
View attachment 65528

I would think that may be ok. You’ll have to see how often the second one kicks on come February. You’d like the 1 heater to be able to get you up to shutoff temp eventually in that window of time ideally but it’s not like it was losing ground.

 

[reef junkie]

I think maybe I’ll just turn the temp down to accommodate the new heaters. Dont think the tank will care if its .5 degrees lower.

 

[Ben Nicholls]

My goal with heater size it to have one run almost continually with the backup heater occasionally kicking in to help out. Less on and off is easier on both the heater and relay and sizing them such reduces the chances of a rogue heater raising the temp too much.

 

[BlindSwordsman]

If this is relevant at all, without a heater, at room temperature set at 74 - 75, my tank would be around 77-78, which I myself would consider that to be hot. So, I actually run my tank around 75. I don't know because of the temperature consistency or they like it in lower temperature, but I have less trouble with my tank with the lower setting. If I can not maintain this temperature some reason, and let it rise up to 77-78, I can see some issues.

 

[reef junkie]

If this is relevant at all, without a heater, at room temperature set at 74 - 75, my tank would be around 77-78, which I myself would consider that to be hot. So, I actually run my tank around 75. I don't know because of the temperature consistency or they like it in lower temperature, but I have less trouble with my tank with the lower setting. If I can not maintain this temperature some reason, and let it rise up to 77-78, I can see some issues.

Ive read that colder temps can give better colors but slow the rate of growth. Not sure if that is true or not. I’ve always ran my tanks at or around 78.