Pump Advice Please! :good:

[Tuppers]

Hi guys getting a water butt from the parents who dont want it and cant be bothered to take it back. It holds 100 ltrs so will come in handy for storing some water for my current tank and hopefully a new one shortly.

My question is I would like to setup a pump inside it so that I can pump the water to the tanks in the house in stead of using buckets? Can anyone suggest a line of action to take? Not sure about this as it stands and think buckets will have to do for now!

also storing the water in this butt IF and I mean IF i choose to have a second tank but go marine can I use the same hose to fill up the marine tank? or do I have to pre mix some salt into the water? Never done marine before so not sure about this.

Cheers hope you all understand

 

[Miss Wiggle]

for FW it'd be easy enough, just get a length of hosepipe and a powerhead then stick one end of the hose into the tank and the end with the pump on into the water butt and switch it on and it'll pump through. the size pump needed is going to depend on how long and high the water would need to go to get to the tank.


for marine it's more complicated, for starters you need to use RO water which is not suitable in it's base state for FW tanks so you'd need a seperate water supply for that, you then have to stick a heater and a powerhead in it, bring it up to tank temp and mix in the salt to the right level before adding it to the tank.

 

[andywg]

For changing smaller amounts (up to 10-15% of a volume) I only ever heat my SW up to room temperature. SW fish can handle far more variation in temperature than many give credit for. You will have to pre mix any salt into the water.

Rather than pumps, try and fit the water butt higher than any tanks (such as in the loft) and then let gravity fill any tanks with a long hose and a tap.

 

[Miss Wiggle]

ooooh i was always told up to tank temp, but i bow to your superior knowledge.

as always with any marine advice, if you're seriouslt considering it then hop over to the relevant section of the forum and start havong a good old read through the stickies and asking questions.