250g Maintenance Free (sorta)

[Hesh69]

freaking awsm man =)

 

[Redoog]

I'm not following what you are trying to say. What do you mean by the 1.57 and .44?

Thats my math !!! .44" is the area of 3/4" pipe, and 1.57" is the area of 2 x 1" pipes.

 

[toffee]

Maintenance free will be dream come true for me, although some folks on this thread may disagree as changing water twice a week seems to be their favorite past time.

I believe that you have two unique contributors:

1. Drip system
2. RUGF or UGMJ (under gravel mini jets).

In you opinion, which one is more crucial? One wonders without the drip system, how often would you have to change water with just RUGF?

My current tank is in the middle of living with no crawl space, so drip system is rather difficult to do. RUGF on the other hand is very doable, in fact I tried doing it once by running the return from sump to UGF plates, it didn't work very well. Probably due to holes being too big and thus pressure too low?

Thanks for sharing your experience.

 

[bomber]

does it matter what size to drill the holes for the rugf?

 

[CHOMPERS]

1. Drip system
2. RUGF or UGMJ (under gravel mini jets).

In your opinion, which one is more crucial?

It's like the apples/oranges comparison...or better yet, like apples to Winnebagos. If you need an apple, you won't want a Winnebago. If you want a Winnebago, an apple just won't do.


There's just no comparison between the drip system or the RUGF. If you can have one but not the other, go with what you can do. But keep in mind that I don't have a crawl space or basement either. I did everything through the attic. It is all in the first few pages of this thread.

And the under gravel jets was a huge flop (not so surprising). The OP even stated that it didn't really work later in his thread but it went viral without anyone reading the whole thread (or to where the OP said it was a dud).

 

[CHOMPERS]

does it matter what size to drill the holes for the rugf?

Yes. The total area of the holes needs to match the cross sectional area of the pipe from the pump. You can adjust the number of holes if the size of the drill bit is an issue.

If the area of the holes is too small, they will cause restriction on the pump. If the area is too large, the water will channel where the restriction is less. If the fish move rocks or there tends to be buildup in one area then the water will want to take the path of least resistance.

 

[bomber]

Would there happen to be a formula to cal. this? I made my rugf out of cpvc so there are only t's, elbows, and now cross connectors. Ill post a photo when I get home.

 

[Redoog]

the formula for area of a cirle is 3.14 X ( r x r) r is radious, or distance from center to edge, or half the distance across.

So for 3/4 " pipe 3/4" = .75" so r = .375

.375x.375x3.14= 0.4415625" area of 3/4" pipe


1/8" drill or .125"
.0625x.0625x3.14= .012265625

so 36 1/8" holes is the same area as one 3/4" hole


.4415625 divided by .012265625 = 36 holes


to compare

1/16" drill = .0625

.03125x.03125x3.14= .00306640625


.4415625 divided by .00306640625= 144 holes

so you can NOT do simple math here and say 8 x 1/8" holes is the same as 1 x 1" hole it will NOT work. A lot of people would assume that it woould take twice as many 1/16" holes as 1/8" holes, but you can clearly see it takes a lot more.

You can also see that depending on the length of the pipes you use for your rugf, you may want to use a smaller drill. 36 holes might not work real good if you have a lot of piping.

so figure that out as well. Hope this helps

 

[sikoko]

sweet set up

 

[CHOMPERS]

I got freaking MATH on my brain!!!

Thanks for taking the time to do that.