Ato

[mike31154]

Originally Posted by schroeder

yes.

That simple solution works. But you may be able to dispense with the float valve as well.

check out nanoreef and see what some folks with pico tanks are doing with pet bottles (meaning hamster water bottles) for simple ATO with no moving or mechanical parts, like this one on a 1.5 gallon tank...

Attachment 5635

I don't know how well this would scale to a larger tank, or larger resevoir, but it's worth a test, with and without a float valve.
Try it out. Let everyone know. Be a hero.

So how does the pet bottle regulate the flow? Is it a constant drip or what? I'd be concerned about the lack of control over the amount of water being topped off. Could be too much or too little depending on how these things dispense the water.

[mike31154]

Originally Posted by Chase31

currently i do not have an ATO and i need to get one b4 i put live rock in or ill be toping it off by hand every day

Manual top off is the way I did it for many moons as well. Works fine as long as you don't go on vacation very often. It's probably the safest way to do it if done regularly.

[Chase31]

yea, that pet bottle will not let any water out if theres no air to replace the water, so when the ends underwater theres no movement when its below it comes out, but 30G at 8-12 hours of light a day will be like me manually doing 1-2G a day

[lastlight]

If you can trust a float valve and don't make your reservoir too large I think gravity feed to the valve is the cheapest and best way. You fill your reservoir once a week maybe with whatever you'll need during that time. No tds creep and since you aren't storing much...a valve fail won't be that bad.

[Chase31]

maybe ill put some money into it