hi.

i got a tetra 9 watt uv sterilizer a couple days ago.

i have the older eheim huge canister that i think flows something like 340 gph.

i took the main outlet of the eheim and used a 't' fitting so half the water still goes out the original main outlet into the tank and the other half flows through a foot of hose to the 't'. the hose comes out of the 't' and goes about another foot and into the tetra uv unit. another foot of hose comes out of the tetra uv unit and goes to 2 biowheels. i replaced my penguin biowheels with marineland unpowered ones in hopes that the spray-bars provide enough backpressure to keep the water in the uv unit plenty long. i just didnt want a power head in the tank because i think they are ugly. i couldn't find a 5/8" ball valve either. so this was all i could think of to do.

does it sound like i have the water going through the uv unit slow enough?
i am thinking having half the water not go through the uv unit at first (due to the 't') does not matter. because it is a closed loop system. eventually all the water goes through the uv unit even though it does not initially go through it, right?

tetra says it needs 100gph or less.

i got the tetra instead of the turbo twist.
the turbo twist is undoubtably better at doing it's job then the tetra unit. however, i feel that the tetra unit is a lot safer. in that the tetra unit isolates the water from the electric part better. that was just my own decision. i just mentioned this since i know soemone is going to say take it back and get the turbo twist .



thanks.

It has been a long day, so I am not sure how you have it plumbed but it sounds like something I mentioned recently on another thread.
Maybe I am reading it wrong but it sounds like you have two "T",s in the setup and this is where you are losing me.
But from what I get of your setup you need too put a ball valve on the UV line. This way you can adjust the amount of water into the UV exactly. Whatever water does not pass through the UV will automatically be pushed out the spray bar. They sell them at drsfosterandsmith.com.

there is only one 't'. one half of the 't' goes to the main outlet. the other half of the 't' goes to the uv. the outlet of the uv goes to the biowheels. i am figuring there is so much backpressure because of the tiny holes in the spray-bars(on the biowheels) that it is keeping the water flow very low.

i figure the water has to go somewhere. i can see what is coming out of the spray bars and it aint much. therefore i am guessing i am at pretty low gph through the uv unit. unless i am missing something in this equation.


thanks.

actually i realized i will need a ball valve anyways. i assume the quartz glass needs to be wiped now and then. if i open it i will need to shut off the water after the 't' or i will end up with 90g of water on the floor!

intrestingly, the tubing 'was' 5/8". it has shrunk to 1/2" i.d.!
which is actually good for me, because i can now just go to ace hardware and get a 1/2" i.d. pvc ball valve. ace has 1/2" but not 5/8". perfect.


jay.

Sounds like you're on the right track Jay. Adding a ball valve will make adjusting the flow a piece of cake. To adjust the flow, just disconnect the hose from the bio wheels and hold it at about the same height as it will go into the bio wheels and time filling a container of a known volume. (1ga in 1 minute = 60gph) Adjust the ball valve until you get the flow rate you're looking for. Then mark the ball valve so when you clean the quartz tube you can set the ball valve right back to the same place. Unplug the sterilizer bulb while you're doing this.

Rick

Be careful when you buy that ball valve. More than likely what ace is going too carry is a slip ball valve. With normal tank pipes, this is not going too work. More than likely you are going too need a ball valve with a barbed fitting.

haha jetman a little late lol. at least i have a sense of humor because i had the maybe worst day in my life today! and it could have been a LOT worse than it was!


ok, so i go to home depot over an hour away(i live on a farm). i figure well i'll be cheap and get 20 parts to make my own ball valve and unions there. they do have 5/8" barb fittings, so i think i am in bussiness. oh boy was i wrong!

i get home assemble it all. it just screws together no glue needed! so far so good.
WRONG! first of all the water was already flowing as slow as it could and still make it out of the other end of the uv unit. when i hooked up the added length of the ball valve with barb fittings on each end and two unions with barbs on the ends it could not even pump through the uv unit. i suspected this.

it gets much worse for me today! i am watching everything already about to unhook it all since it is barely flowing. when one of the unions starts to leak.
i try to adjust it and it bursts open. sending all the water spraying onto the power strip! gfci does not trip! and then-----FIRE!!!!!!

if i was not there my whole house may have burned down!

so i have to put out the fire. then i have no power! so i have to be gone for several hours to go back to the store to get a new gfci, new hose, and a new power strip.

meanwhile no heat in the tank and no filtration(including no biowheels).
luckily it is real hot out and the temp only droped 1.7 degrees while i was gone.


i actually count myself very lucky it could have been much worse.

moral of the story, unless you really know what you are doing do not try to save money by doing 'diy' at home depot! if you need valves and unions, get marineland magnum 220/350(1/2"-5/8"), they are the best. i just didn't want to spend the money, sorry me!


anyways i only have two questions.
> first of all the 5/8" pvc hose i got at home depot smells really bad. nothing was run through it it was off a new roll. it must have a lot of petroleum product when they manufacture the hose. do all hoses smell like that or did i just poison my fish ontop of killing their biofiltration????

also, how often do i have to clean the quartz tube in the uv unit? without unions it will be more difficult but certainly not impossible.


ok, sorry to get on such a soap box here. i was just scared and sad today.
if i can help anyone else avoid what happened to me it will be worth my troubles.

please don't just say i am stupid and and this wouldn't happen to anyone else.
that will make me feel even worse. shucks, i aint a plumber!

i am just praying my beloved fishies will survive all of this. it happend about 6 hours ago already and they look ok. but you never know with all that stress they could get ick or something. fingers crosed!

jay.

Sorry about your adventurous day but it happens too all of us at one point or another.

Question #1
I have never heard of pvc smelling like petroleum. Normally with flexible pipe of that diameter you would use vynil tubing.
Question #2
It all depends on your source water. If it is hard you will have too clean it more frequently. I don't run a UV on my tank but do have one on the koi pond. The unit I use has built in wipers so I never have too worry about it.

Oh man... tough day! With all the problems you're having getting that sterilizer hooked up, I'm sorry about telling you to "get the sterilizer you'll never regret it" in your "preventing floaty" topic.

Rick

After rer-reading your thread I think I have found your problem.
I assume you only have the ball valve on the UV to bio wheel line. Correct?
If this is true there may be too much backpressure on that line and water will always flow too the least resistance. In your case your spray bar.
The solution is too install a ball valve AFTER the "T" fitting but BEFORE the spray bar. This way when you throttle down the spray bar the rest of the water will be sent through the UV. Leave the valve on the UV line in the open position all of the time and adjust your flow accordingly.
Just get a regular barbed ball valve fitting of the proper size and a pair of scissors. Cut that line in half and just put the valve in. Should take less than a minute.
I hope this picture helps

the outlet of the uv is conected to the spray bars. there is no separate 't' there.
the 't' is between the pump,uv, and a second outlet. i did that on purpose, since the spray bars provide a great reduction in flow due to their tiny passage ways.

i had the valve right after the pump outlet 't'. then i had a union then the uv unit. after the uv unit i had another union then on to the biowheels.
for one thing the unions that screw together are designed for outside sprinklers. i don't think they are 100% water tight. that might be what happened to me. i do not need to reduce the flow through the uv unit. i had the ball valve so i could shut off the outlet from the pump. because the hose that is still in the water will start to back-siphon as soon as i open the union and let air into the system.

i am just looking for an easier way to be able to remove the uv unit for cleaning. i do not need to reduce the flow at this point.
the problem i have is that the pressure is so low through all of this that by adding the disconect unions and the ball valve to prevent back-siphonage once the water makes it through the uv unit there is not enough flow to even power the spray bars. by adding all the valves and such i must use a much greater length of tubing to avoid kinks. the eheim as good as it is can not overcome the resulting back pressure to travel the head that big.


i pour ro from my kitchen sink in the tank. and i add a mineral stone every time one disolves. the buffering capacity is real good.
but i still get gunk out of the outlet of the eheim if i turn it off and back on. so this can clog it.

i hear the quartz is super fragile anyways. another disaster waiting for me probably.
so i am hoping i do not need to clean this but once every six monthes or so?
if that is the case than it is easy enough to just pull the hose off the barb end. it pulls off rather easily. all the unions, even if i had the head pressure to overcome them seem to pose a leakage issue.
if i have to clean this thing every week or something maybe i am sorry i bought it now.

as for the fishies, they all look ok. so hopefully no harm was done with no filter and no heat for a few hours during my 'mishap'.
i might just go get a micro-head to power this thing. even though i wanted to avoid that since i think they are ugly.

what i really need here is a ball valve/disconect combination like the ones from marineland but they canot be as long. the ones from marineland mesaure about 7 inches long which means i will need a large loop of hose to avoid a kink. this will not work here. i need something like this that is less than 4 inches long.
the eheim stuff will not work here either since it is metric. i have to use an adapter as it is. so if i have to add more adapters the thing gets even longer.
any ideas for a tiny valve/disconect?

also, the tubing i used is 'poly vinyl' tubing. same stuff as aquarium specific. have no idea why it smells funny. but so far it hasn't seemed to do any harm.


jay.