Neptune Apex Programming Tutorials, Part 3: Automatic Top-Off Kit (ATK)

[rkpetersen]

My issues were the following: the auto detect on port 1 and 2 was not optical, it was water on floor. I had to manually change this. I also thought the water line was supposed to be BETWEEN the 2 optical sensors, in the sump.

This is a pretty common misconception.
As you've figured out, the water level should cycle above and below the lower sensor.
You can set up alarms that tell you if the low sensor isn't opening and closing on a regular basis, as it should.
High sensor is emergency backup; it should never be closed under normal operation.

 

[chicago]

Mine just failed. For two days on my 30 gallon grab QT. Salinity up to 1.027. Stressed frags out.

 

[SuncrestReef]

Mine just failed. For two days on my 30 gallon grab QT. Salinity up to 1.027. Stressed frags out.

Did you try the troubleshooting steps in the article?

 

[kevin.st]

Mine is not working. I hate this. I should have followed my intuition and bought the tunze.

 

[SuncrestReef]

Mine is not working. I hate this. I should have followed my intuition and bought the tunze.

Like I asked the previous poster above, did you try the troubleshooting steps in the article?

 

[kevin.st]

I’m at work, so I can’t fiddle with it now. But I’ve read a lot of posts and talked to a couple of people about this. I’m frustrated and I’m busy with my life and work. With the tunze, you just plug everything in and it works. I guess I was expecting similar.

 

[SuncrestReef]

I’m at work, so I can’t fiddle with it now. But I’ve read a lot of posts and talked to a couple of people about this. I’m frustrated and I’m busy with my life and work. With the tunze, you just plug everything in and it works. I guess I was expecting similar.

The whole reason I wrote this tutorial article, and the other 7 articles in this Apex tutorial series, was to help people to understand how these products work, how to properly set them up, and how to troubleshoot them. I'm sorry you're frustrated, and can understand life being busy. However, it doesn't do you or anyone else any good to post your frustration and bash the product here in this article comments section if you haven't actually taken the time to read it and follow the recommendations.

I have heard from over 100 people that this article has helped them, and I'm very glad it did. I'd like to think the troubleshooting steps will help you as well. Just please don't come here to vent. There are plenty of other threads on R2R for that.

 

[kevin.st]

Ok, yes, I have read the article. Many times. I thought there was something else I was missing.

 

[kevin.st]

So, I emailed tech support and they quickly responded and said they could fix it. I went home and called them and sure enough, through some trial and error, they helped me fix it. The issue was a connection to the FMM with the sensor cables. The person at neptune had me unplug and plug in several times, while twisting the cables. Eventually, fusion picked up both sensors and we are good to go.

SuncrestReef, thank you for helping me through this.

 

[Mspitz2]

Yes it was a great help

 

[Craig77]

This is a great article. My RODI (and PMUP in a basin) are both in the basement (below my display tank). I also plan to setup a DOS based auto water change. I'm concerned about potential autosiphon leaks. Is there a way to count the number of minutes during a period of time (e.g., 12 hours) that the ATK turns the PMUP on? I did set the maximum number of minutes that the ATK will run each time without turning off (which is a good approach and would catch a relatively large autosiphon event). I'm wondering about a slow gravity syphon that might be harder to catch, but would probably show up if I could add up all the ATK refill time during a day or half a day. I can look at this manually via fusion, but I'm wondering if there is a way to setup a virtual output type of alert for something like this. Thank you so much for putting this all together!

 

[SuncrestReef]

This is a great article. My RODI (and PMUP in a basin) are both in the basement (below my display tank). I also plan to setup a DOS based auto water change. I'm concerned about potential autosiphon leaks. Is there a way to count the number of minutes during a period of time (e.g., 12 hours) that the ATK turns the PMUP on? I did set the maximum number of minutes that the ATK will run each time without turning off (which is a good approach and would catch a relatively large autosiphon event). I'm wondering about a slow gravity syphon that might be harder to catch, but would probably show up if I could add up all the ATK refill time during a day or half a day. I can look at this manually via fusion, but I'm wondering if there is a way to setup a virtual output type of alert for something like this. Thank you so much for putting this all together!

The Apex does not have any math capabilities, so there's no programmatic way to count how many times it has run. If you are concerned about a siphon, be sure to install the ATK's anti-siphon fitting above the PMUP in your ATO reservoir. When installed correctly, it's impossible for a siphon event to occur.

 

[Craig77]

The Apex does not have any math capabilities, so there's no programmatic way to count how many times it has run. If you are concerned about a siphon, be sure to install the ATK's anti-siphon fitting above the PMUP in your ATO reservoir. When installed correctly, it's impossible for a siphon event to occur.

Thank you. Yes, for the ATK reservoir, I put a check valve in place above the PMUP to prevent back flow. My main concern is related to an automatic water change where the line removing "dirty" water in the sump will be below water level and was concerned that my ATK would just keep topping off to cover up a slow leak related to the AWC potentially and was hoping there was a nice way to check for this somehow with a code and error alert. I've seen others put a solenoid valve to break a potential auto siphon on systems like this (e.g., AmroAzul has a YouTube video describing this here: ). Thanks again for putting together this very helpful series.

 

[blstravler]

Hi @SuncrestReef - have a question. I've been having an issue with my ATO HI sensor coming on and I couldn't figure out why. The ATK pump wasn't coming on and overfilling but it was happening everyday consistently during the same hours. I final figured out that when my MP40's are cranked up from 11-2 they were pushing water down into my sump because of the wave action they were creating. So is there a way to add a Defer statement to delay the alarm coming on?

Right now the alarm is set to -

If ATO_HI CLOSED Then ON

Is there a way to add a Defer to this? So something like -

Defer 002:00 if ATO_HI CLOSED then On

When the Alarm comes on it is only ever on for about 90 seconds. So if I can defer for 2mins I believe this will stop all of my false alarms. The alarm is coming on about 8 times from 11-2 and the alerts are really annoying. If I can't add a defer time I thought about just moving the sensor up higher.

 

[SuncrestReef]

Hi @SuncrestReef - have a question. I've been having an issue with my ATO HI sensor coming on and I couldn't figure out why. The ATK pump wasn't coming on and overfilling but it was happening everyday consistently during the same hours. I final figured out that when my MP40's are cranked up from 11-2 they were pushing water down into my sump because of the wave action they were creating. So is there a way to add a Defer statement to delay the alarm coming on?

Right now the alarm is set to -

If ATO_HI CLOSED Then ON

Is there a way to add a Defer to this? So something like -

Defer 002:00 if ATO_HI CLOSED then On

When the Alarm comes on it is only ever on for about 90 seconds. So if I can defer for 2mins I believe this will stop all of my false alarms. The alarm is coming on about 8 times from 11-2 and the alerts are really annoying. If I can't add a defer time I thought about just moving the sensor up higher.

Yes, this is commonly done by using a virtual output to monitor the optical sensor, then add a Defer timer and any other exceptions you'd like, such as ignoring the sensor during Feed mode. Then in your EmailAlm program, replace the line that monitors the sensor with a line that monitors the virtual output instead:

[Alert_ATO_HI] <-- virtual output
Set OFF
If ATO_HI CLOSED Then ON
If FeedA 005 Then OFF
Defer 002:00 Then ON

[EmailAlm]
Set OFF
If Output Alert_ATO_HI = ON Then ON

See my tutorial on Virtual Outputs for more details:

Neptune Apex Programming Tutorials, Part 5: Virtual Outputs

Part 5 of our Apex Programming Tutorials. This one is on Virtual Outputs.

www.reef2reef.com

 

[DanATL]

The article was helpful to me in setting up my ATK this week. As you pointed out, sometimes sensor1 and sensor2 are switched in the magnetic bracket from the factory so be sure to check. Mine were backwards but that was obvious when I tested it. I also switched the float valve and sensor direction to fit in my return compartment. The video to do that is on the Neptune site but it's obvious if you take it all apart. And no, I am not the guilty party who swapped the sensor positions by mistake!

 

[SuncrestReef]

The article was helpful to me in setting up my ATK this week. As you pointed out, sometimes sensor1 and sensor2 are switched in the magnetic bracket from the factory so be sure to check. Mine were backwards but that was obvious when I tested it. I also switched the float valve and sensor direction to fit in my return compartment. The video to do that is on the Neptune site but it's obvious if you take it all apart. And no, I am not the guilty party who swapped the sensor positions by mistake!

If you flipped the float valve around, be sure the water doesn't trickle down onto the optical sensors because that can cause faulty readings. The optical sensors should face the opposite from the valve exit.

 

[DanATL]

If you flipped the float valve around, be sure the water doesn't trickle down onto the optical sensors because that can cause faulty readings. The optical sensors should face the opposite from the valve exit.

For sure. I flipped everything around so the water exits on the back side of the optical sensors. Another point of user error is I was only getting ~20sec pump runtime and a dribble of water and then it dawned on me that the float valve was closing way too soon so a minor adjustment of that was in order. I also enabled logging on the ATK_PUMP to give me an idea of how often and how long it runs. That little PMUP is pretty loud!

 

[ZombieEngineer]

It might be worthwhile to include some additional information here from my programming guide. I still don't know why Russ didn't sticky this on Neptune forums.

ATO Failsafes

This Thread explains the different fail-safes that can be used in an automatic top off (ATO) code that can improve reliability and prevent catastrophic failure. It is important to use protective code in order to prevent the ATO pump from sticking in the ON position when a float switch fails...

r.tapatalk.com

 

[wsanley]

Nevermind. Read post wrong.