Surge tanks? Ala Tropical Paradise?

[sfsuphysics]

[quote author=GreshamH link=topic=564.msg15619#msg15619 date=1170838435]
After all, he is a stationary engineer
[/quote]
He's an expert at making paper?

 

[Mr. Ugly]

The stationary engineers at my workplace are very good at just sitting there doing nothing. Preventing maintenance, we call it

 

[GreshamH]

Has your building flooded? If not, they did their job

<smug ON>
Yah Mike, he makes paper
<smug OFF>

He's an expert on water related things, and a DIY guru

 

[Mr. Ugly]

Floods, dead exhaust fans, broken heating control valves, misprogrammed hvac controllers, air compressors running out of oil... hehe, you name it

Plus they won't even fix stuff after we diagnose the probs for them. Or else they say they did the repairs, but when we check, the broken control valves are still there, and the main valves have been turned off and forgotten.

 

[bookfish]

[quote author=sfsuphysics link=topic=564.msg15612#msg15612 date=1170825220]
A surge would be a nice DIY, I could do one, although just have not had the time/effort/desire to set one up (that and I don't have the bulkheads).

As for the Calfo overflow? Bah, external coast to coast overflow! why waste prescous tank space.

[/quote]
Sorry, I won't dignify that comment with any response. Even a sarcastic one.

 

[Raddogz]

[quote author=Mr. Ugly link=topic=564.msg15642#msg15642 date=1170879788]
Floods, dead exhaust fans, broken heating control valves, misprogrammed hvac controllers, air compressors running out of oil... hehe, you name it

Plus they won't even fix stuff after we diagnose the probs for them. Or else they say they did the repairs, but when we check, the broken control valves are still there, and the main valves have been turned off and forgotten.
[/quote]

Yeah, but I get all kinds of "stuff" from my guys. "Hey, do you have bolt like this?" I get five.

The best one to date is for my little bowfront on my desk - it has a custom corian bottom complete with rubber feet between the base of the tank and the desk.

 

[fishnfst]

Here is a pic of mine when I was testing for tank and drain capacity.. I ended up reducing the downpipe to 1" to slow the surge down just a hair.. 2" was way too big for my small tank.. Water was splashing over the farside out of the tank The air vent ala waikiki aquarium made the surge much more reliable.. You can kinda see it in the pic.. There is a T cut in right above the tank with a 90 degree hose barb fitting on it.. I hook it onto the edge of the reservoir so when the reservoir fills up to a certain point it basically closes the vent off and the surge begins.. It also allows for quite a bit of air to escape out of the siphon tube before it reaches the tank..

 

[sfsuphysics]

Is that air valve inside the tank?

You mention that it cuts off the airsupply after a certain level, this is all I can think of is that inside the tank when the water level rises it'll go into the hose.

 

[fishnfst]

Yup that is exaclty how it works.. I will take a pic of it in action.. In this pic it is laying in the tub there.. i was using my thumb to stop it for testing purposes.. I just use an intake pipe for a canister filter that I made out of 1/2" pvc and some 90's. I started with it a little long in the reservoir and just kept trimming it until it seemed to work the best...