so i dont have to do water changes anymore??

[spiff]

wow i cant believe i didnt consider that! ok ok rethink rethink

Just because its not as effective as another way of doing it doesn't mean its not worth doing. Basically, you would be wasting more water for the conveinence of not having to do it manually.

 

[benito1188]

Just because its not as effective as another way of doing it doesn't mean its not worth doing. Basically, you would be wasting more water for the conveinence of not having to do it manually.

yea, thats actually the whole point cause i cant do daily water changes with my discus

 

[gzeiger]

I don't believe that there would be any temperature shock to the fish as long as the new water is mixed in at a constant rate rather than batch additions.

 

[DB junkie]

It's going to be more consstant then doing waterchanges. THAT is what is important. You will still have to poo vac regularly but you will never have the consistancy with WCs as you do with drips.

Whats the point of having super low nitrate levels if they are going to rollercoaster right back up over time till that next big WC?

Maybe I'm blind but I don't see why 50 gallons all at once makes a tank cleaner then 50 gallons over time?

 

[patatmblife]

You will use more water to maintain the same nitrate level with a drip system, for the same reason that doing two 25% water changes back-to-back isn't as effective as one 50% wc.

Considering he is moving from LA to Asia I don't think the water bill will be an issue. Although unless you are thinking about placing the tank and sump very high I can't see how you can utilize an overflow in the sump unless you have a basement or a water waste line below ground where sump is sitting on.

 

[Egon]

thanks aquanerd. hey DB, i slept on it and finally figured out what you ment by "hole" ahhhh(shoot me lol).

ok so im sorta changing the design. aquanerd, i havnt done this tank yet...i want to learn EVERYTHING to a T before even daring to drill my first hole lol. anyway, this design is gonna be in asia, "they say" that water is fresh, clean and free of chlorine, with that said im basing this set to that. i would still be cautious and might to what you recommended (carbon filters, etc) just to be on the safe side. when i get there, im checking out water parameters just to be sure, incase of chlorine or god forbid, chloramine i would prob have to modify this set up a bit.

my main concern is really gravity. i have never had a sump or drilled tanks before. been always comfortable with the security of my ever reliable canisters lol so all this overflow, drilling, etc is somewhat new to me.

thanks so much

I did this exact set up! It works great. No more hoses, buckets, forgetting to turn the water off LOL.

I put the fresh water from the tap directly into the top of the fish tank. 1 gallon an hour + or - a little. 24 gallons a day. The overflow to the sump handles this fine, ya gota make sure your overflow will handle the extra water or you will over fill your tank! The pump continues to move the same amount of water from the sump to the tank so I added an over flow to the sump that drains the added 1 gallon and hour water right to my back yard.

Bonus: 1)Power outages the flow continues from the tank to the sump, of course it's only 1 gallon an hour but at least it's something.

2)Power outages cause the sump to fill and this over flow from the sump to the back yard keeps the sump from spilling over. Not a big deal in my case because my sump was made to hold the extra water then I added this system. My next tank ,however, will be made so the overflow will go to the back yard.

3)Another thing is I believe this is a less stressful system than a 20% water change all at the same time. Just my opinion.

4)simple, of course you have to plump water to/from the tank

 

[Egon]

Oh yeah another thing, the roses in the back yard love the fish water! I was watering the roses anyway now I just water the fish tank instead and the "used" water goes to the roses. free......kind of, when you think about it. I know it's a stretch (smile)

 

[benito1188]

haha its good to hear from someone who's actually done it im currently doing about 65-75 gallon water change on my tank DAILY. im moving to asia for school and im planning to get serious with the books this time around lol but i just cant survive with out fish(once its in you...its in yah lol). it takes me about an hour to an hour and a half to do this and this much time is something i cannot waste anymore. im one of those hard core discus keepers and i wouldnt do it anything less. sigh... if this "drip system" fails me, il just plumb a couple of big pipes in the tank that will drain the tank in seconds(hopefully) and plumb the tap water on top of the tap directly..and make the back part of the tank mostly an overflow LOL at this point i dont know what im dealing with til i actually get my feet wet and start this darn thing. thanks for all the help guys, appreciate it ALOT