High Tide Aquatics

Tunze 3155 vs Smart ATO micro?

georgec

georgec

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For some reason I’ve been having some issues with my current ATO setup:


IM Nuvo 14 with a high and low float switch in the return chamber. They’re hooked to my Apex with standard coding.

I don’t have time to futz with it and it didn’t matter when I had a larger tank and sump. However, with the new tank, there’s not much buffer for if the ATO fails either way.


I’ve been reading through different forums and manuals for ATOs and think I’ve narrowed down to the Tunze 3155 or the AutoAqua Smart ATO micro.

For the tunze:
- 99% of owners swear by it. It seems the go-to choice.
- I like the float switch failsafe if there’s a sensor failure.
- the only issue I’ve read is that it sounds like it runs for a bit upon powering on. Not an issue if I had a sump, but in the current tank, not a ton of space for an extra dump when not needed. Had anyone else experienced this? It sounds like it can be a cup worth of water.
- pump is noted as 110lph at .9m and sounds like it’s adjustable. Seems to be a slower flow rate than the micro - which is a plus for my small tank.

Smart ATO micro:
- I like the small size.
- from the manual, it sounds like the only failsafe is if the pump runs 3x longer than normal. If that’s the case, not entirely comfortable with it.
- manual says pump is 280lph (no info on head correction)

Any thoughts? Cost between the two isn’t an issue for me. I just want to get the more reliable one.

Thanks!
 
I've been running the Smart ATO Micro on my tank for a while. I'm pretty happy with it and prefer it's simplicity over the extra wires and switches of the Tunze. I'd buy it again over the Tunze for that reason.

I think the fail safe on the Smart ATO is more than adequate protection. My tank tops off normally with a 2-3 second run of the pump, so it's probably less than a quart of water. If it puts 3 quarts in then, it will shut off and start beeping. That's a minimal blip in the salinity level if it's anything at all. The only time I've ever had a problem is when the sensor got really dirty and it didn't pump or when my ATO reservoir runs out of water and the pump runs longer than expected and sounds the alarm. The Smart ATO does have a blue light inside the sensor to help it see the water level, so just be advised it may be visible in your Nuvo. Not sure if that's an issue for you.
 
2-3 quarts is a lot of water for my tank. It would be close to flooding.

For reference, I’m using a 2 gallon reservoir and it takes almost 2 weeks to go through it.
 
georgec said:
2-3 quarts is a lot of water for my tank. It would be close to flooding.

For reference, I’m using a 2 gallon reservoir and it takes almost 2 weeks to go through it.
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Yes, but the Smart ATO learns based on your own tank. Assuming it's in your back chamber, it will probably only need to pump a few tablespoons of water before the level rises back to where it needs to be. The Smart ATO learns that and then if it pumps 1/2 cup one time, it will shut off on your tank.
 
bluprntguy said:
Yes, but the Smart ATO learns based on your own tank. Assuming it's in your back chamber, it will probably only need to pump a few tablespoons of water before the level rises back to where it needs to be. The Smart ATO learns that and then if it pumps 1/2 cup one time, it will shut off on your tank.
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Can you adjust the pump flow rate? I didn’t see anything in the manual about it.

You mentioned 2-3 seconds for a little under a quart. That’s a pretty fast fill. Do you have any head on it or is your reservoir next to your sump. I’d be pumping up about 3-4 feet which I know could help slow the flow rate some.
 
georgec said:
Can you adjust the pump flow rate? I didn’t see anything in the manual about it.

You mentioned 2-3 seconds for a little under a quart. That’s a pretty fast fill. Do you have any head on it or is your reservoir next to your sump. I’d be pumping up about 3-4 feet which I know could help slow the flow rate some.
Click to expand...

It comes with a clip for the outlet tube that has a screw to allow you to clamp the plastic tube down to reduce the flow some.

When I had it installed on my planted tank, I had it going through a glass tube that was about as small as an airline tube. That reduced the flow considerably. It ran for about 10-20 seconds in that type of configuration.

I think either of those options would work for you.
 
For the Smart Micro ATO, i recommend always power on and off the ato whenever you do a water change or make a significant change in your tank like adding rocks that changes water volume.

This ensures that the safety algorithm is calibrated to the new tank. Meaning, it stops and alarms should it ever fill beyond 3x the time it fills on power up
 
I run Tunze nano osmolator on 14g, 20g, 22g, 29g. Mine do NOT dump in a cup of fill water when plugging in. There is a jumper you can easily reverse in the power supply to adjust fill rate. My 22g is a Long and needed the extra fill because I think it was cycling on and off constantly because of the large surface area, but the adjustment fixed it. Never tried the AutoAqua.
Ps I think there was recently a thread comparing these two ATO you might be interested in.
 
I have both of these on customer tanks back in TX. IME the Tunze is more robust, hands down. You are correct in wanting the 3155 instead of the 3152 if robustness is your main concern. I don't really want to list all the failure modes that I've seen (many maintenance related, but who wants to have to clean their ATO sensor?), but I can if people care.
 
jccaclimber said:
I have both of these on customer tanks back in TX. IME the Tunze is more robust, hands down. You are correct in wanting the 3155 instead of the 3152 if robustness is your main concern. I don't really want to list all the failure modes that I've seen (many maintenance related, but who wants to have to clean their ATO sensor?), but I can if people care.
Click to expand...

Thanks. I didn’t care as much when I had a bigger tank and sump. With the AIO, there isn’t much room for error. So, definitely looking for reliable and redundancy.

I guess I could always do the micro and leave a float switch in as a failsafe. I’ve just heard great things about tunze and their customer service.
 
I would try to stick with the full size one just because it has two sensors. Optical sensors have different failure modes than float switches, so I like the idea of having one of each. Optical sensors also hold a better level than most of the tilting and sliding float switches I've seen. Admittedly a higher water volume than you but I know someone who ran one on a ?32? Biocube. His tank went from frags to literally out of space in under a year with mainly SPS so it wasn't holding him back. He was a first time tank keeper too, amazing how things work when you follow all the good practices and advice. One of these days I'll follow all the pieces of advice I gave him, I just don't want to pay for following them on a large tank (namely frequent large water changes).

Additional note from comments above. A quart in 3 seconds is 300 gph, which sounds really high for an ATO pump. The Tunze pump as an example claims 12.4 gph at 5' head. The SmartATO units I've used have comparable flow rates as the Tunze.
 
Thanks. I meant one option for me is to do the smartATO micro with one of my existing float switches as backup.

For the tunze, I’d definitely go with the full size one/ optical with float.
 
Hmm. This whole time I thought you were talking about the Nano. I use the 3155 on my big tank, but Nanos on the other 4 with ATO. I love the Nanos even though they don't have the same redundancy as the full size. I really do not think I could fit an additional sensor in any of my tiny AIO chambers.
 
Oh yeah - on my full 3155, it never dumps in a cup of water when powered on either. That is my favorite piece of equipment and I can't believe I thought there was no need for ATO when I had a tank at home long ago.
 
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