Air System Project - Hot Pump

[LanaK]

So I set up my air system last night, which was awesome, however when I came down this morning to check on it, the air coming from the pump was rather hot, and so was the pump.  It is an Alita 80 and I have 26 drops from it, ranging from a few inches to 8 feet.  Is it normal for them to get so hot or should I be bleeding off more air? 

The air pump is located outside the fish room as it was sorta loud, in an unheated portion of the basement and the total run length of the loop is about 40 feet.  I have the pre-made air manifolds from Jehmco and am using 5/8 tubing to connect them.

Thoughts?

[Ron]

Most of the pumps require on air passing through to cool them. They'll get warm, but not hot IMO. If you restrict the airflow too much, then they get hot.

To figure out how much should be bled from a pump, I'd setup all my filters and then keep opening up more to bleed the pump's output down to a point where I notice a reduced strength of bubbling at the filters due to the pressure drop. Then reverse gears and close up the bleed to get the strength of the bubbling at the filter back to where I want it.

[LanaK]

Do you leave the valves open all the way when you do that? What I think I did was that, but then closed off the filters so that they weren't so vigorous and it might have restricted too much.

[cranialdisturbance]

That is a very large pump for 26 drops. I'm running 32 drops with an Alita AL-40.

[LanaK]

Oh I know I overbought.  The goal it to have a bigger room someday soonish, so I bought a size up and now I am wondering if I am going to regret it.  I might have to investigate in some sort of pressure release valve in the meantime.

[Ron]

Do you leave the valves open all the way when you do that? What I think I did was that, but then closed off the filters so that they weren't so vigorous and it might have restricted too much.

You need to do things in this order:
1. Set how fast you want your filters bubbling
2. Bleed extra air until you see a reduction in your filters (which means you've exceed the max pump output)
3. Restrict the bleeding slightly so the filters return to the desired bubbling

[lilscoots]

What Ron just said.  open up some extra ports until you see reduced output at your filters, then slightly close the open port(s) to get the bubbling you're looking for.

You've got too much pressure in the line due to not enough drops so you're going to have to just open up some ports and let it bleed until you add on.  You don't need a special valve, you just need to let more air escape.

[jcunningham0295]

You can also add a T after the pump and before your first valve and have the bottom of the T go into a piece of pvc attached to a ball valve and use this to bleed of extra air as well.

[LanaK]

So I went home and rebalanced at lunch like Ron said and have a few that are open, and have just enough pressure to get to my big deep tanks.  Given this, should I not have to worry about the pump working too hard now?  Is there other things I should be doing? 

Thanks for all the advice, this is my first whole room set up and I want to make sure I am not messing it up too much.

[Ron]

Is the pump running cooler now?

An extra tip, to quiet down wide-open valves that are simply bleeding air, run them to large air stones (left out of tanks; just put them on a shelf or something). It'll disperse the air and get rid of the "hissing" noise.

[SKISWETPETS]

A little side note, I was concerned about my Blower in my basement possibly running to warm or overworking. I spoke to our Diagnostics/Trouble shooter at work, and he suggested doing an Amp draw test on mine. I borrowed his meter and tested mine, and it was fine. Within the Range it should be. Just a thought/possibility.  It was very simple with his help.