water changes??

[RG81]

I was just wondering, i noticed a lot of tanks that have there corals placed almost all the way to the top of the tank in pictures... What happens when you do a water change, if you do one at all in a tank like that??? I have a 55 gallon and do a 10 gallon water change every two weeks, it brings my water line down a few inches after the remaining drains into my sump... I was always afraid to put corals too high in the tank for fear of being exposed to just air for the length of time during a water change!
Is there something i am missing should i not worry?? It may seem like a silly question but i was just curious....

thanks in advance

 

[MikeNapoli]

I have ball valves on my drains and my returns so I just close them up and whatever is in the tank stays there. Then I pull all the water out of my sump, fill it back up with new saltwater, get it to temp and then turn my pumps back on w/ the ball valves open. (It sounds alot less work than it is)

Ball vavles and unions should be used as much as possible when plumbing your tank... I learned that the second time I plumbed my tank.

 

[Phyl]

We also drain water from a sump rather than a tank. We did drain water from our tank when we first set it up and we would bring the water level down to below some of our corals, but I wouldn't personally want to do that with SPS corals.

 

[tcollins]

Phyl,

How big of tank and how much do you think your changing through the sump when you do this out of total water volume?

 

[Phyl]

Our system now is nearly 570'ish gallons and when we change water we do it 110 at a time. We take 55 from the sump (which leaves it with barely enough water to run) and 55 from the 125 "frag tank that has more rock than my display right now". We use the house waste system to drain the tank (we've plumbed it in) so getting rid of 110 g of water from our basement is easy to do.

When we had the 120 with the sump under we'd drain 25g or so (a garbage can full) at a time out of it. Probably 15 out of the tank and the remaining 10 from the sump. The stuff at the top would be out of the water for a short period. This was mostly an anemone and maybe some SPS, but I don't really remember it well.

On our 65 we change about 20g of water at a time out of the tank and the rock/shrooms/leathers/hair algae are out of water for a short period of time before the water is replenished in the tank. They don't seem to notice.

 

[harlequinreef]

many corals are exposed to low tides and tropical heat or rainstorms in their natural environment

 

[MikeNapoli]

Phyl, what kind of sump do you have?

 

[JohnS_323]

It's a 100g RubberMaid stock tank.

 

[pgordemer]

I do it similar to Phyl and John.. (and copied their idea of the valve manifold system.)

My sump is a 40 gallon breeder in the basement. I turn off the return pump and let it drain back down from the upstairs display tank (Its only about 1 inch). I then throw 2 valves and turn the return pump on to move the sump water right into a waste sink and down the drain. I them drop a mag 7 into a 42 gallon brute garbage pail on wheels and pump the water into the sump.

The entire process (excluding making the water up) takes 10 minutes. I change 30 gallons, which works our to be 25%, every 2 weeks.

 

[twan]

From the sumpless, non-valve, Nano side...............I do my water change and the corals along the top (many xenia stalks, 1 zoa, 1 monti cap) get some fresh air for 30mins and I havent had any problems.

 

[MikeNapoli]

I do it similar to Phyl and John.. (and copied their idea of the valve manifold system.)

My sump is a 40 gallon breeder in the basement. I turn off the return pump and let it drain back down from the upstairs display tank (Its only about 1 inch). I then throw 2 valves and turn the return pump on to move the sump water right into a waste sink and down the drain. I them drop a mag 7 into a 42 gallon brute garbage pail on wheels and pump the water into the sump.

The entire process (excluding making the water up) takes 10 minutes. I change 30 gallons, which works our to be 25%, every 2 weeks.

Is there anywhere on this site or anyone have a diagram of the valve manifold system?

 

[JohnS_323]

Mike, there are pics and drawings of our system in THIS thread. The drawing is kind of busy now but you should be able to get the idea of it from some of the earlier pics. Feel free to ask me any questions you may have about it.

 

[MikeNapoli]

Thanks John.

 

[pgordemer]

Is there anywhere on this site or anyone have a diagram of the valve manifold system?

On the side view of my sump pic, look on the wall on the left. The horizonal PVC pipe with valve connections going up. Notice spare port so you can plug in other stuff later.

 

[Hawkeye]

Nice - also nice to see someone else uses purple pvc cement besides me...

 

[MikeNapoli]

Nice - also nice to see someone else uses purple pvc cement besides me...

The purple is the primer. You should use it to make sure the PVC gets a good bond with cement. I know alot of people don't use it because it's just another step.

 

[Hawkeye]

primer...that's right...it's been like 4 years since i used the stuff...lol. Thanks for the tip. I think phyl mentioned that there was a clear primer that could be used-so the pvc pipes wouldn't show purple everywhere. Anyways- the set up is nice. If it were me there'd be purple gobs everywhere! ;D

 

[Phyl]

Purple is required by code when you're doing home plumbing because that's the only way the inspector knows that primer was used. For non-home plumbing the clear primer works just as well (just doesn't leave things as purple).

 

[Carlo]

I used the purple primer on my system setup also but I kept a paper towel roll handy and wiped up the excess immediately after joining the pipes together. I've found if you are fast enough you can wipe the excess away and have a clean look as if you didn't use the purple primer at all.

I previously failed an inspection when selling my old house because some of the fishtank plumbing didn't have it. I thought that was stupid as it didn't have anything to do with the "normal" household plumbing but it was a township thing. I figured on the new house I wouldn't take any chances...

Carlo