Hello everyone. This is my first post, and I hope someone can help before I lose all of my hair! I have a saltwater aquarium and it has a sump underneath it. It drains water from the display tank above, goes through a few things that realy don't matter, and the water returns to the display tank via a pump. My problem is this, water evaporates pretty quickly. The normal solution to this problem is take an extention cord, split and cut one of the two wires(midway), and connect a float valve to the two leads. Then plug a power head into the outlets on the end of the extention cord. The idea is, when the float drops down, the circuit completes, turning the pump on, the pump draws water from a storage container and puts it into the sump until the float goes up, cutting the circuit off, and killing the pump.
A second problem is that the pump needs to be off when feeding the fish. I would always unplug the pump, feed the fish, when they ate all the food, I would plug it back in. She hates this idea!
I do have to agree with her, a little. I do think this is very ghetto! My wife is already pretty irritated that we have to have to have all the plumbing and other crap just for a few cool looking fish. She calls it my "science experiment". I would realy like to have a nice, neat, sophisticated looking something or other to make her happy, but still something that looks cool to impress my friends.
My ultimate plan is to use a plain old Radio Shack project box that houses a switch, to turn the whole circuit on and off, maybe with a few lights to tell me if the pump is on and off, then go through to a single outlet where the pump plugs in, then through a relay or two, (however many I might need) then through two float switchs about three or four inches away from eachother, (verticaly). When the water drops below the bottom one, it will kick the pump on, (plugged into the bottom outlet) and the pump will run until the top switch turns the pump off. I need the switch to shut everything down so she can flip it, feed the fish, and flip it back on a few minutes later.
I tried to do this using a 125V switch from Radio Shack, then an outlet, the to through one float switch, then to another outlet. The first outlet for the sump pump, the second for the new water pump. This didn't work at all. For some reason the first outlet tested at like 30VAC the second tested at around 90VAC I know I did something wrong. I have seen where people have made similar set-ups using 12V relays. I thought that 125VAC relays would save on confusion. I know I could easly be wrong. I hope someone could help me. I'm afraid my wife is going to get rid of me and the aquarium both. Please help me! Thank you all very much for any help you can provide.
A second problem is that the pump needs to be off when feeding the fish. I would always unplug the pump, feed the fish, when they ate all the food, I would plug it back in. She hates this idea!
I do have to agree with her, a little. I do think this is very ghetto! My wife is already pretty irritated that we have to have to have all the plumbing and other crap just for a few cool looking fish. She calls it my "science experiment". I would realy like to have a nice, neat, sophisticated looking something or other to make her happy, but still something that looks cool to impress my friends.
My ultimate plan is to use a plain old Radio Shack project box that houses a switch, to turn the whole circuit on and off, maybe with a few lights to tell me if the pump is on and off, then go through to a single outlet where the pump plugs in, then through a relay or two, (however many I might need) then through two float switchs about three or four inches away from eachother, (verticaly). When the water drops below the bottom one, it will kick the pump on, (plugged into the bottom outlet) and the pump will run until the top switch turns the pump off. I need the switch to shut everything down so she can flip it, feed the fish, and flip it back on a few minutes later.
I tried to do this using a 125V switch from Radio Shack, then an outlet, the to through one float switch, then to another outlet. The first outlet for the sump pump, the second for the new water pump. This didn't work at all. For some reason the first outlet tested at like 30VAC the second tested at around 90VAC I know I did something wrong. I have seen where people have made similar set-ups using 12V relays. I thought that 125VAC relays would save on confusion. I know I could easly be wrong. I hope someone could help me. I'm afraid my wife is going to get rid of me and the aquarium both. Please help me! Thank you all very much for any help you can provide.