laguna mesh mod

[KevinK]

Originally Posted by Delphinus

Very crafty and resourceful!

Can you go into more detail on how you made the volute?

How did you attach the disk to the magnet? Just curious. I mesh mod'ed my Bubble Magus a little while back and just used Weldon16 to attach the disk ... I'm not sure how long it will last.

I mounted a disc of 2 mm acrylic on the pump disc with a 2 part epoxy gel, reason for this is because I did a test to se if weld on would stick to both, and it only stuck on the acrylic.

same I did with PVC glue, and it did not stuck on any, meaning there are 2 totally different materials, the 2 part epoxy was for connecting several kinds of plastic and worked fine.

after grinding off the impeller blades, I put the pump on and smoothened the surface with sand paper, this way, whit the disc spinning it would become nice and balanced.


as you cans se below on the picture, this is how it should have locked like, mine is nice circle from the inside, but the outside appears bit bulky.



anyhow, the reason for me to go for the pvc body was

A -because this would make connections east, otherwise you always had to play around with pvc and acrylic
B- the pump it selve has a kind of a disk of 1/2 inch that is still pump housing that fits in the volute, and is exact 3 1/2 inch in diameter, I have locked around and could not find a exact 3 1/2 inch inner diameter pipe, it would always be 3. 6 ore 3.7 inches

the inner diameter was critical because the part of the pump that still fits in the volute has a O- seal, if it it off by 1/ 12 inch ore even less, it would not seal and leak (for a in sump model maybe not such a problem)

now whit the PVC I drilled a 3 1/2 hole, which turned out to be slightly over this, so no seal, however the pvc body was so sturdy that I could put pressure on the bolds that hold the body in place, to press against the pump.

I placed an O- seal (from a RODI canister) around the pump base, I angled the volute part that would connect to the pump slightly on a angle, so in fact it would press down as I fasten the bolds, as well as inwards against the pump body, making a 100% seal




A = the slight angle of the end of the volute body
B= 1/2 inch air intake
C= existing O- seal on the pump
D= new thicker O-seal

on this picture you se that the pump originally has a few slots (as the body is PVC, I gust filled them and sanded it to be smooth) ( 1 and 2)



the fastening nuts imbedded in the pump housing I removed and drilled the hole threw to the other side (now I can pass a bolt threw the volute body, threw the pump, and place a nut)
(A,B,C,D)

the entire pump is dead silence, only draws 60 watt of power, and delivers thons and thons of air (fine bubbles this is)

[KevinK]

as a test I again aded 3 inches to the skimmer neck, to se how it would preform under the same settings, but longer neck.

again, impressive what this change did after 3 days running, meaning the 3 aditional inches wil stay and I wil fasten them to the rest of the skimmer nek.

as mt skimmer cup is not tall enough, it wil stay like this and I cant run another test with even a larger nek, as it now is 7 inches from the sealing, and I need to get my hand in to clean the skimmer neck each few days