David Cottle
Member
I set up my planted aquarium in the past year after discovering how much aquaculture has added to the hobby in the 40+ years since I last kept tropical fish. More attention is now paid to water chemistry - of necessity in a planted tank - and I soon wanted continuous water-change, because it just makes sense to me.
I first tried a siphon-drip from the tank combined with conventional auto top-off equipment. I used a float-operated top-up valve and redundant high-level switches with relays operating solenoid valves in the water supply. To be fail-safe, the valves were a normally closed design that had to be energized to stay open in normal operation. I found the solenoids ran too hot, and there was too much hardware in the tank to keep clean. So I went back to the drawing board.
My present design, in use for two months now, has a top-up arrangement that works by siphon, with no moving parts or electricals. I don’t know why this method isn’t in common use - for automatic top-ups at least, if not continuous water change - but I haven’t found it described anywhere. Maybe it is being used and I just haven’t found it?
My setup is shown in the video:
I first tried a siphon-drip from the tank combined with conventional auto top-off equipment. I used a float-operated top-up valve and redundant high-level switches with relays operating solenoid valves in the water supply. To be fail-safe, the valves were a normally closed design that had to be energized to stay open in normal operation. I found the solenoids ran too hot, and there was too much hardware in the tank to keep clean. So I went back to the drawing board.
My present design, in use for two months now, has a top-up arrangement that works by siphon, with no moving parts or electricals. I don’t know why this method isn’t in common use - for automatic top-ups at least, if not continuous water change - but I haven’t found it described anywhere. Maybe it is being used and I just haven’t found it?
My setup is shown in the video:
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