Apex kit suggestions

[Bent17]

Going to bite the bullet and go for the Apex. I want to have the trident also to continuously test my mag cal and kh. Apart from those what do you suggest I get? I have 2 redsea x4 dosers so I take it that I will have to get rid of those as you cant integrate with Apex right? Nice to have is salinity and PH. Those come with the Apex or just PH?

 

[elamatts]

It really just depends on what all you want from it and how much you’re willing to spend! I do maintenances in my area and have multiple accounts with all the bells and whistles: auto dosing, testing, top off, water changes, feeding, flow monitoring for UV, as well as all the probes just to name a few things. I only mention this because what you can do all depends on what model you get. The A3 and jr. have limitations because they lack the ports or outlets all together. The A3 pro has everything.

The Red Sea dosers won’t work unfortunately…. you can still use them, just will be separate from the Apex. You can plug it in to the energy bar but it’s only able to turn them off and on. Also, you don’t necessarily “need” the Dual Dos Reservoir… it’s just helpful to have if you’re out of town for extended time and need to see how much you have left to dose. I typically use the BRS mixing jug but whatever you have the dosing stuff in right now is fine.

If you’re not planning on going crazy I would just do the regular A3 and move essentials like the pump over to the energy bar. That way you can program alarms if anything goes wrong. Neptune unfortunately removed the salinity probe from their base models so if you wish to have that you’ll need to purchase it separately. Think they run about $100?

To answer your original question:
I would definitely invest in an ATO and some kind of reservoir or barrel for RO. It’s so nice to not have to top off all the time! Also would get at least two optical sensors to monitor the water levels in the sump. I like to have these so that if the water level gets too high or too low, an alarm will go off and notify me immediately. It’s pretty straight forward - “closed” means the water level has covered the sensor and “open” means the water is below it. You can program the ATO to work with these instead of a float valve but I would still recommend one anyway as backup. Neptune came out with the “liquid level sensor” a couple months back but I have only had problems with them, so I would recommend the optical sensors instead.

Sorry for the essay, but I hope this helped a bit!

 

[Bent17]

Thanks for your help! For starters I have the redsea ATO+ so that is covered as it tops off water automatically and comes with a water leak and temp sensor also.

My tank if fully automated. I have all devices on smart plugs so I can turn on and off anywhere around the world.

As mentioned I want to have flexibility and automated testing with Trident which makes life easier.

I work in tech so I love gadgets so prob A3 Pro is the best for me..

I have seen many mixed reviews and some mention go for it and some say stay away so still not sure what to do!

 

[bushdoc]

I have Apex Controller and Red Sea dosers, surely they are not fully integrated with Apex, but it might actually be a benefit as you don’t want to rely on one device only. Also Apex dosers are not the highest quality and I retired DOS and keep it in garage just in case.
As far as salinity/conductivity probe it doesn’t come with all models, but I wouldn’t rely on it too much, as it is a bit finicky. Yes, pH probe comes with all version and its nice to have.

 

[elamatts]

Thanks for your help! For starters I have the redsea ATO+ so that is covered as it tops off water automatically and comes with a water leak and temp sensor also.

My tank if fully automated. I have all devices on smart plugs so I can turn on and off anywhere around the world.

As mentioned I want to have flexibility and automated testing with Trident which makes life easier.

I work in tech so I love gadgets so prob A3 Pro is the best for me..

I have seen many mixed reviews and some mention go for it and some say stay away so still not sure what to do!

Oh I see!

Sounds like you pretty much have everything. If you’re just wanting the trident, the jr. is really all you need since it’s more of a monitoring unit than a full blown Apex. The point of an Apex is to both automate and monitor. If you have the automation already, all you’d be adding with a full unit is the monitoring side.

But If you love tinkering with stuff, I agree the A3 Pro might be good for you. It’s basically a programmer’s dream.
I don’t know the intricacies of other automation systems as I’m only familiar with Apex, but what I like about it is the fact that it’s essentially a detailed log with an alarm system. Here’s a screenshot of the probes for one of my accounts:

(Ignore the salinity, it needs recalibrated)
I can go back at least 3 months on all of these graphs.

 

[Bent17]

Yeah I can go for the Jr however I would have two monitoring systems which I would like to consolidate everything to one. With the JR I can connect the trident right and have PH and Salinity probes?

 

[vetteguy53081]

Going to bite the bullet and go for the Apex. I want to have the trident also to continuously test my mag cal and kh. Apart from those what do you suggest I get? I have 2 redsea x4 dosers so I take it that I will have to get rid of those as you cant integrate with Apex right? Nice to have is salinity and PH. Those come with the Apex or just PH?

You can replace dosers with Apex DOS which is their doser version and I recommend their AFS auto feeder. Optional is their leak sensors which I utilize and I do not recommend their PMUP auto top off which has unreliable pumps.

Go onto their product page and you will see the many options offered

Apex Controller System

Welcome to the future. The New Apex controller system has WIFI built in, includes a redesigned Energy Bar 832 with eight 120V AC outlets, includes an internal 100W 24VDC power supply as well. That power supply feeds three built-in 1LINK ports as well as two 24VDC accessory ports. Each...

shop.neptunesystems.com

 

[SPS2020]

Stay far away from the Apex Jr. Lots of folks have issues with that unit. Choose any other but that one.

I have an Apex eL (no longer made), a Trident and RedSea ReefDose 4 and love that configuration.

Also, I echo what @vetteguy53081 mentioned about the PMUP, it is garbage IME. If you go the Apex route, you can use the liquid level sensor and a Kamoer F1 pump for ATO. I've used this configuration for three years and it has been flawless. You first determine about how much evaporation you have to replenish, set that value in the Kamoer to dose every day. I go just a little over and the level sensor will sense the level and turn off the Kamoer F1. In that manner, you are only replenishing a certain amount of water each day.