What do you do with your used tank water?

[wingin_it]

Hi, i've been lurking on his site for a while now, there is so much useful information! Love it. I can spend hours researching all subjects about discus. But as the title states i'm wondering what everyone does with all of there used tank water, im Sure some simply drain it away but what about those with huge tanks?(100 gallons or more) I personally couldn't imagine sending 70+ gallons down the drain for water changes.

Regards, Darcy

[gills]

have always put it out into the yard and plant beds. It didn't matter if I had 30 plus tanks or just 3 like currently. I think alot of people on here reuse it outside also.

[Wes]

Send it in the yard flower beds lawn.

[pauline]

I run mine outdoors except during freezing weather. Also fill several milk jugs with bottom of the tank siphoned water and use it for my house plants.

[sammy]

Outside on the lawn. My set up is numerous 20 highs and a couple show tanks in my house - I use alot of water.

[Skip]

Toilet

[ZX10R]

Both my 120 and 180 drain out into the yard

[ROOK45]

Both my 120 and 180 drain out into the yard

+1 (only in the summer to water plants)

[Bill63SG]

Down the drain.

[Jeff O]

Toilet

+1

[Trier20]

Drain

[discus6628]

drain. thought about to yard but I have to pump it out due to raise foundation. Therefore, drain was the way on easy setup.

[a volar]

Drain also.

[hmslowes48]

I use mine to water the sand which is the only thing that grows out here in west Texas!!!

[GrayLadyPat]

A bit goes to help keep the 4 houseplants I own alive, and the rest goes into the Drainage ditch outside

[PAR23]

Out on to the lawn.......I have the greeniest lawn in the neighborhood:D

Unfortunately I can't pipe directly into drain system as my cess pool will not be able to handle amount of water discarded.....:(

[Wjmulder]

piped directly into the drain

[John_Nicholson]

Right now I am changing 300 to 400 gallons a day. It just runs out to the pasture.

-john

[wingin_it]

Thanks for your replies, it seems a pretty even mix of people just draining, and sustaining plant life in there house/yard. Maybe in the winter in the colder parts, flood the back lawn and make a skating rink for the kids? :P

[chaoslite]

Straight out the door and into my roommate's girlfriend's garden.

Mishka

[Chad Hughes]

I store mine and use it for irrigation as needed. I would not recommend this in freezing weather.

The drainage system that I have actually drains the waste water from the fish room to a sump. The sump pump pumps the waste water to a 1000 gallon holding tank system. The holding tanks are connected to a pump and garden hose that, when I need to irrigate, I flip a switch and water away!

I like to use my waste twice as much as possible. :D

[DonMD]

The sump pump pumps the waste water to a 1000 gallon holding tank system. The holding tanks are connected to a pump and garden hose that, when I need to irrigate, I flip a switch and water away! :D

Chad, I've thought about setting up a similar system, but I always ran up against the possibility that my wife might flip the switch, then go out to water, and forget to turn the pump off when she was done, and possible ruining the pump. (Well, I'd forget, too! Can't blame it all on her) So, do you know of any way that a hose nozzle could simultaneously activate a pump?

[-gb-]

I've never considered piping used tank water into an outdoor storage barrel for use in my garden. I'm going to set this up in the spring.

[Chad Hughes]

Don,

The best thing that I can recommend is using a sump pump. Sump pumps are equipped with a float valve that, when the water level gets low enough, it shuts the pump off. The problem with this in your case is once you start adding water back to the storage sysem, the pump will turn right back on.

There are relay circuits that you can design (I'm an engineer so I'm always divising some sort of control circuit for something) that will latch the pump off until you tell it to turn on again. That's another thread though...

Hope that helps some!


Chad, I've thought about setting up a similar system, but I always ran up against the possibility that my wife might flip the switch, then go out to water, and forget to turn the pump off when she was done, and possible ruining the pump. (Well, I'd forget, too! Can't blame it all on her) So, do you know of any way that a hose nozzle could simultaneously activate a pump?

[discus6628]

Hi Chad,

What type of sump pump that you refer to? I got my sump and tank as use. The intake to the sump is a little slow than return to the tank. Therefore, I have to modify the sump a little so that it won't dry up for pump to pump out. When it is low in water level it start to make noise. I am interest in the sump pump that will turn off when it reach low level of water. Hope is not that expensive. Also another question since you are engineer, do you use any device to check when water fill to certain level and it will shut down the value for fill in water to the tank. I ran across to those device on couple thread before but I think it is a little expensive. Hope you have other less expensive method.


Don,

The best thing that I can recommend is using a sump pump. Sump pumps are equipped with a float valve that, when the water level gets low enough, it shuts the pump off. The problem with this in your case is once you start adding water back to the storage sysem, the pump will turn right back on.

There are relay circuits that you can design (I'm an engineer so I'm always divising some sort of control circuit for something) that will latch the pump off until you tell it to turn on again. That's another thread though...

Hope that helps some!

[Chad Hughes]

Tony,

Sorry for the late reply. I lost track of this thread.

The sump pump that I prefer is a Wayne 1/2 horse power sump pump. I've found them cheapest on Ebay (http://www.ebay.com/itm/NEW-WAYNE-CDU800-SUBMERSIBLE-CAST-IRON-USA-MADE-1-2-HP-WATER-SUMP-PUMP-SWITCH-/130790670070?pt=LH_DefaultDomain_0&hash=item1e73bb3ef6#ht_485wt_1165). This pump comes with a shutoff float so it only turns on once the water level is high enough to activate the switch.

As for shutting off the pump once your storage tank is full, a hudson float valve will work but the sump would continue to run if the float is activated. A more complex sensing system would be necessary to coordinate a full condition shutoff. Even if you had this in place, the sump may overflow if you are not aware that your holding tank is full. My holding tanks have an overflow on them. Once I hit 1000 gallons, the tanks overflow (they're outside).

Hope that helps!

[Wahter]

I drain the water onto my lawn; our winter's are not to harsh here (zone 7), so I do this during the winter too.


Walter

[Curt]

Summer out side for plants. Winter save a couple galons for house plants, rest down the drain. When i build my fish room, will pump waste to the lawn. And when warm enough out to the yard in winter.

Curt

[dagray]

I syphon my tanks into five gallon buckets and take it outside to water the flowerbed or special trees I have purchased for my wife (even in winter). Then to refill the tank I put the filtered water (single pass carbon filter to remove chlorine/chloramine) in a stainless steel pot and heat to 80 degrees and fill the tank with that water so as not to shock the fish with the 40 degree water comming out of the filtered water tap.

[Discus novice]

Used to water the flowers or drained directly

[dagray]

Part of why I siphon my water from the tank into five gallon buckets is so I can localize my watering as my front yard doesn't have grass, but my wife has some flowers and trees and even in freezing tempuratures they need some water or the freezing and wind we have will dry out the sandy soil too much killing off the flora.

Dave

[xKevinx]

i pump my used water out of my fish room and into my garden which i have laid weeping pipe underground of the rows works great for natural fert.

[star rider]

out to the lawn...with mine...

[sandy]

I reuse it on my garden as here water shortage is the main issue

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