Drilling into a perfectly fine UV sterilizer

[Chris.sturgis]

This is obviously not advised but I decided to take a gamble and drill and tap the casing to thread in a valve to purge the air since I have the sterilizer mounted upside down. Turns out it can be done. I haven’t seen anyone do this so I figured I would post it.

 

[this is me]

Why is it being mounted upside down?

 

[Chris.sturgis]

Why is it being mounted upside down?

Because I wanted the swing check valve directly after the return pump. I could have mounted it right side up but that would have resulted in more turns then I would like. With the check valve being there I only need to purge the air out after doing maintenance.

 

[this is me]

So how do you prevent the water siphoning and drained from the housing in an event of a pump failure? The UV bulb would either burn itself out running dry and/or cause a fire.
Ensuring there’s always water in the tube is most important when setting up a UV sterilizer.

 

[Chris.sturgis]

So how do you prevent the water siphoning and drained from the housing in an event of a pump failure? The UV bulb would either burn itself out running dry and/or cause a fire.
Ensuring there’s always water in the tube is most important when setting up a UV sterilizer.

On the second picture there is a gate check valve directly below the inlet of the Uv sterilizer. If the pump turns off water holds in the system. I also have code in the apex to turn the Uv sterilizer off whenever the return pump is off and I have leak sensors which will also turn both off.

 

[Cooper2]

So how do you prevent the water siphoning and drained from the housing in an event of a pump failure? The UV bulb would either burn itself out running dry and/or cause a fire.
Ensuring there’s always water in the tube is most important when setting up a UV sterilizer.

Unless I'm mistaken the valve is only open for bleeding air out and closed when done. When closed it won't allow air in to siphon and will remain full.

 

[Chris.sturgis]

Unless I'm mistaken the valve is only open for bleeding air out and closed when done. When closed it won't allow air in to siphon and will remain full.

Correct

 

[this is me]

I personally would not rely on flow sensor or gate valve to prevent things from happening. I rather just have it so that it can’t happen.
But what do I know.

 

[this is me]

Unless I'm mistaken the valve is only open for bleeding air out and closed when done. When closed it won't allow air in to siphon and will remain full.

That is understood and if he had mounted the UV correctly in the first place, he would not have to deal with any of that.

 

[Chris.sturgis]

That is understood and if he had mounted the UV correctly on the first place, he would not have to deal with any of that.

Funny thing is I don’t even use that flow sensor regularly or have the impeller installed in that flow sensor since itself causes a restriction, I only put it in use when I am trying out different configurations. I feel confident that if anything catastrophic went wrong it would trip my gfci and kill power to everything.

 

[this is me]

That will only happen when you’re on your 2 weeks vacation.

 

[this is me]

You can heed my warning or not. But it doesn’t take much for that UV bulb to blow in an enclosed tube with only air in it.
And you may not even know it until the whatever in the bulb has leech into the tank and kill stuff.

 

[JohnK]

You can heed my warning or not. But it doesn’t take much for that UV bulb to blow in an enclosed tube with only air in it.
And you may not even know it until the whatever in the bulb has leech into the tank and kill stuff.

Classic Nick style - Maybe blunt and harsh, but right. Advice that's best not shrugged off.

Happy reefing

 

[Cooper2]

The bulb doesn’t get wet. It’s in a quartz tube. Are you saying the bulb will heat the quartz tube to the point the quartz fails when dry? I’m afraid I don’t think that’s possible. Might have to throw an old bulb in a 25 W aqua and test. I don’t think it can happen.

 

[Chris.sturgis]

The bulb doesn’t get wet. It’s in a quartz tube. Are you saying the bulb will heat the quartz tube to the point the quartz fails when dry? I’m afraid I don’t think that’s possible. Might have to throw an old bulb in a 25 W aqua and test. I don’t think it can happen.

The bulb could potentially overheat and also heat up the sleeve which could cause thermal stress and crack the sleeve. All UV sterilizer bulbs and quartz sleeves have a life cycle and it is best to perform preventative maintenance on them and replace parts before failure. I’m not too concerned with with loosing prime and having a overheat failure since I have it on my calendar every 2 months to clean my pumps and check valves and redundancy with the apex but nothing is guaranteed in this hobby haha.

 

[JohnK]

All other things aside, with this set up as it is, have you considered using an aqualifter or other means to have a continual pull / purge vs as needed? Could be another potential point of failure, but just tossing the idea out there.

 

[this is me]

The bulb doesn’t get wet. It’s in a quartz tube. Are you saying the bulb will heat the quartz tube to the point the quartz fails when dry? I’m afraid I don’t think that’s possible. Might have to throw an old bulb in a 25 W aqua and test. I don’t think it can happen.

Try it and report back.

Disclaimer: I’m in no way responsible for your curiosity that may cause bodily injury and/or death.

 

[this is me]

Classic Nick style - Maybe blunt and harsh, but right. Advice that's best not shrugged off.

Happy reefing

Haha.
Just trying to tell people to keep the set up simple and effective so that maybe they can be in the hobby for longer and not get burnt out(pun intended).
None of those fittings and electronics are needed if the UV is simply mounted and set up correctly.

 

[Cooper2]

I learned just for ease of maintenance that my UV units will be vertical and easily accessible. I also learned if using the 3/4" fittings at the UV it's pretty much throttled at 350GPH. Once I realized this, I don't waste a flow sensor on this anymore. Having said that, not all first designs are optimum, and you might feel better incorporating vertical mounting on your next tank simply to keep it simple and reliable. Vertical mounting lets you remove and clean the Quartz without losing any water, a nice little benefit as well.

 

[Chris.sturgis]

Haha.
Just trying to tell people to keep the set up simple and effective so that maybe they can be in the hobby for longer and not get burnt out(pun intended).
None of those fittings and electronics are needed if the UV is simply mounted and set up correctly.

Certainly the best way to mount it to avoid the housing being completely drained is horizontal with the inlet and outlet pointing up. Aqua ultraviolet and many other manufacturers also say you can mount vertical and that would also cause potential draining scenarios while the light is on. From the original post I said what I did was not advised but I wanted to share that it could be done if needed.

All other things aside, with this set up as it is, have you considered using an aqualifter or other means to have a continual pull / purge vs as needed? Could be another potential point of failure, but just tossing the idea out there.

If anything I would try to find a air release valve which would automatically vent the air. I have used large ones in my past for pressurized waste water forcemains and they work well, my only concern with those would be potential salt buildup in the valve causing it to leak by or not work at all.