Some plumbing help/ideas needed. Let's see yours.

[DarkSoul]

I'm working on plumbing my FX6 for my 90g into 2 Hydor 200W heaters and what will be a Cerges reactor when the parts arrive, however I've run into a bit of an issue.

If I add valves below the heaters the entire unit is far too tall for me to add anything else to it, and I intend on also adding an EcoPlus pump on the output to help lessen the head pressure seen by the FX6 and to keep the flow rate high.

I wanted to have valves in place above and below the heaters in case I ever needed to replace one so I wouldn't have to shut the filter off and drain out the pipes just to put in a new heater. Since this is so tall with just the valve below the heater there's no room above the heater for a valve, thus making any valves put in place there essentially useless.

I built my stand so that there would be room on the left side for a quarantine tank and I really want that to be there, so I'm trying to keep everything on the right hand side of my stand.

Lastly, I'll also have another EcoPlus for the purposes of doing water changes so that I can just flip a switch and pump out large volumes of water quickly and to also allow a fast filling and draining of the quarantine tank with water from the main tank.

I'd love some some input from people who have plumbed up their systems with PVC, preferably from anyone who might happen to have done this with similar equipment as mine.

 

[Rbishop]

Go horizontal?? Longer down on one, then elbows on both to the valves?

 

[DarkSoul]

Go horizontal?? Longer down on one, then elbows on both to the valves?

I don't quite follow?
I can't run those heaters horizontally but you did get me thinking about maybe using another couple of 45's and putting the heaters or piping at an angle somehow.

 

[Rbishop]

heaters vertical....elbows off the bottom of direct lengths to horizontal valves....

 

[Rbishop]

! !
H H
! !
! L____V_____
!
L__________V_____

 

[DarkSoul]

! !
H H
! !
! L____V_____
!
L__________V_____

Ahh ok I see what you mean now, I don't exactly have the space available lengthwise to be able to do that, but you did give me another idea about using some vertical space underneath my FX6.

 

[dudley]

and I intend on also adding an EcoPlus pump on the output to help lessen the head pressure seen by the FX6 and to keep the flow rate high

Do you know that the filter pump shuts off every 24 hours to purge any air?

Why not just hang the whole contraption behind the aquarium, maybe closer to the end of the tank for servicing?

 

[DarkSoul]

Do you know that the filter pump shuts off every 24 hours to purge any air?

Why not just hang the whole contraption behind the aquarium, maybe closer to the end of the tank for servicing?

Ya I actually forgot about that, but that's still only for a minute or so..... but I think I'm going to run it separately anyway, except maybe share the inlet tube and outlet....so the FX6 and this manifold would be running in parallel.

 

[dudley]

I am using the Hydor ETH heaters on a 75G (200W) with Eheim 2028 and a 220G (300W) with Eheim 2262 and find that they are more than sufficient to keep the tanks at 78F year round. I do keep the house temperature at 74F during the winter time because I have other tanks without heaters.

Unless the room you will be keeping this tank in is unusually cold and you don't have a glass canopy on the tank, I would think that the Hydor ETH 200W and the FX6 should be sufficient, at least in my experience with maintaining a 78F tank temp.

I still prefer to see the heater hanging off the rim of the tank and the filter intake/output going upward toward the tank rim rather than looping down below the top of the filter, less problems with priming and flow reduction IMO.

I'm assuming you will run the Cerges reactor separately?

 

[DarkSoul]

I am using the Hydor ETH heaters on a 75G (200W) with Eheim 2028 and a 220G (300W) with Eheim 2262 and find that they are more than sufficient to keep the tanks at 78F year round. I do keep the house temperature at 74F during the winter time because I have other tanks without heaters.

Unless the room you will be keeping this tank in is unusually cold and you don't have a glass canopy on the tank, I would think that the Hydor ETH 200W and the FX6 should be sufficient, at least in my experience with maintaining a 78F tank temp.

I still prefer to see the heater hanging off the rim of the tank and the filter intake/output going upward toward the tank rim rather than looping down below the top of the filter, less problems with priming and flow reduction IMO.

I'm assuming you will run the Cerges reactor separately?

I'm more worried about the heating in the winter, but even that shouldn't be a problem because out apartment is usually pretty warm. It will have a thick plexi lid, with a nice seal on it to reduce evaporation and most importantly, humidity in my apartment. We're on the 3rd floor and it gets really humid sometimes.

In the winter it may get cooler but I don't think the tank should be effected. It does sit about 15' away directly in front of our patio door, but I don't forsee that being an issue.


The cerges reactor I'm going to run on the manifold with the heaters such that it will flow parallel to the manifold inlet, and will output just before the heaters so that all of the water is heated an there isn't any bypassing.... at least that's the plan right now

I'm having a height issue currently because I wanted to install a valve above and below each heater to make it simple to remove one in case of a problem, then I won't have to cut flow to the entire manifold to do a replacement, this has made the unit very very tall though.
I think I can solve this and shorten it the inch or two that I need by using street elbows in a few key places.

After the manifold is built, I'll put an EcoPlus 594GPH pump on the output so water gets sucked through the manifold and then returned to the tank from the pump.

Attached are pics of some other ideas I'm playing with. the last one being where I'm currently at.