Automatic ATO after water evaporation in reef system

[Reefbase1]

Hi everyone,

I'm new with Neptune Apex system and not an expert with programming. I'm looking for line of codes to program my ATO with my Neptune Apex Pro system for the task below. What I'm looking for is:

When water evaporated from my reef tank, the Neptune Apex salinity probe reported the salinity level goes up. I like to use my equipment to bring my salinity level back to normal:

a) does anyone have expertise in programming with Neptune Apex so if salinity level goes up because of water evaporation, Neptune probe will detect it and will get the ATO or DOS to automatically add soft water to the tank slowly until salinity level is back to normal? Once salinity level is back to normal, the ATO will stop automatically adding water to the reef tank.

b) from your experience, what would you use to complete this task? A Neptune DOS or an ATO? (I do not know if the additional information may help for the ATO, I do not own it yet. I own a Neptune DOS only for now. I'm looking for a Neptune, Tunze or Red Sea ATO system that will be compatible with Neptune Apex Pro)

Thanks for your help,

Alain

 

[Formulator]

This is not a viable way to setup an ATO. Salinity readings will take too long to stabilize in the system and the amount of evaporation needed to get a significant change on your salinity meter is too much. At that point you might as well do manual top-offs because your ATO will be dumping gallons at a time anyways instead of gradually keeping up with evaporation all the time with small additions of freshwater.

For an ATO you need to use a float switch, optical sensor, or pressure switch (Avast). Or a combination of these things for redundancy. This way your ATO pump turns on based on water level rather than salinity. You can still use salinity as a backup failsafe to turn the pump off if it gets stuck on and your salinity drops below a set level.

 

[Formulator]

This is how my ATO system is setup with apex.

 

[Reefbase1]

This is not a viable way to setup an ATO. Salinity readings will take too long to stabilize in the system and the amount of evaporation needed to get a significant change on your salinity meter is too much. At that point you might as well do manual top-offs because your ATO will be dumping gallons at a time anyways instead of gradually keeping up with evaporation all the time with small additions of freshwater.

For an ATO you need to use a float switch, optical sensor, or pressure switch (Avast). Or a combination of these things for redundancy. This way your ATO pump turns on based on water level rather than salinity. You can still use salinity as a backup failsafe to turn the pump off if it gets stuck on and your salinity drops below a set level.

Great. . You are right. I will control it base on water level instead of salinity.

Thanks for your advice

Alain.

 

[Reefbase1]

This is how my ATO system is setup with apex.

Great. Thank you very much. Your drawing and the programming will help me a lot to set it up properly.

Alain.

 

[Formulator]

Great. . You are right. I will control it base on water level instead of salinity.

Thanks for your advice

Alain.

Check out the Avast Parrot ATO system. Its the best for use with Apex in my opinion. Or if you are looking to save money, you can set one up using a couple apex optical sensors and a water container DIY style. I think the optical sensors are only $30 or so. You would need 2 of them and would set it up the way I have my salt mixing station in the diagram, except your sensors would be mounted in the sump, one at the water level set point and one slightly below that. I just realized my code for that part is reversed though. You want to turn the pump on if the low sensor is “open” and pump off if the high sensor is “closed”.