Rollermat Reef Filter

I designed this filter to fit in my 40g breeder DIY sump. It's been up and running for a few months now and works great. The motor, power supply, and float switch can all be purchased off of Amazon pretty cheap. As I've tested and refactored this over the couple months the list components and hardware has evolved

11/27/22 - After about a year of use the motor died from corrosion and had to be replaced. Therefore, I highly suggest sealing the motor compartment with some silicon once you've got everything wired up and working to prevent this!....

05/26/22 - After couple of months of working, the take-up roller printed flange finally gave out, allowing the motor to just spin endlessly. To resolve that I added a metal flanged version of the roller. I purchased a pack of 4x6mm flange from Amazon.

04/24/2022 -Version 2
I've refactored the top Holder to be printed in pieces rather than one large structure. This makes it much faster/easier to print. The removable leg on the take-up roller also makes it easier to swap out the used roll.
I've also designed a set of add-on leg extensions that can be used to implement an optional low-fleece sensor. The sensor is a cheap reed switch that can send a signal to a controller like the Reef-Pi when the fleece gets low or runs out.

• 1x Bringsmart 12V 6rpm DC Worm Gear Motor
• 12V power supply
• [Female Power Jack] (https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0838RJJBD/ref=sspa_dk_detail_3?psc=1&pf_rd_p=0c758152-61cd-452f-97a6-17f070f654b8&pd_rd_wg=tlZoH&pf_rd_r=P3WFSS2RZSNSA5QE2MW0&pd_rd_w=3uFKq&pd_rd_r=cd3669b4-c5c8-47a7-91e3-5f9f2bae6ef9&s=electronics&smid=A2QDC4SXGIBAA1&spLa=ZW5jcnlwdGVkUXVhbGlmaWVyPUEyUzc4Q0YzREdDT1k2JmVuY3J5cHRlZElkPUEwMjk3OTQ0QkZUS1RQOEpHNlhSJmVuY3J5cHRlZEFkSWQ9QTA0NDIxMjBPUFRHQ0U5SEhEU1Amd2lkZ2V0TmFtZT1zcF9kZXRhaWwmYWN0aW9uPWNsaWNrUmVkaXJlY3QmZG9Ob3RMb2dDbGljaz10cnVl)
• [2x Vertical Float Switch] (https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B07211T6Y6/ref=ppx_yo_dt_b_search_asin_title?ie=UTF8&psc=1)
• 1x mini momentary switch
• SK-3000 Replacement Fine Fleece XL
• 2x table levelers used as the clamp screws from local hardware store
• 4x M3*8 cap screws from local hardware store to attach motor

Optional Controller Integration (e.g. Reef-Pi)

• 2x Step-down Buck Converters used to step down the 12V from the power supply to 3.3/5 volts for the raspberry-pi GPIO
  • Reed switch
• Magnet

• Reef Rollermat - Body
• Reef Rollermat - Holder (Wide)
• ReefRollermat-_Plug (x2)
• Reef Rollermat - Hanger Left
• Reef Rollermat - Hanger Right
• Reef Rollermat - Top - Inlet (optional)
• ReefRollermat-_Roller
• ReefRollermat-_Roll_Cap (x2)
• ReefRollermat-_Axle (Threaded)
• ReefRollermat-_Axle_Nut
• ReefRollermat-_Short_Axle (x2)
• Reef Rollermat - Axle (Long) (x2)

03/16/22 - Decided I needed a top inlet and side hanger mount options. The bottom stand doesn't allow for the vertical adjustment needed to set the water lever within the filter Body, other than simply cutting the legs to desired height. The side hanger though required a change to grate pattern in the Body so they're symmetrical. To accommodate the Top Inlet I created a wider version to move the rollers outward. The Body and Roller dimensions are same between versions so either Top fits. I also swapped the side inlet and float hole positions in the new Body to move the float lower. So here's a breakdown of the parts for the different versions:

03/18/22 - Initial wet test and the hangers need some more support. Added additional material to the bottom and that seems to fix the issue. Also need to redesign the inlet cover so distribute the flow. Otherwise the float takes a direct hit which affects it functionality.

3/20/22 - seems to working as expected. Roller has advanced a couple of time. Looks like the top cover isn't needed at all.

3/29/22 - Ok about a week and half of wet testing and we needed some changes!

• Integrated a motor housing into the roller holder (wide version only) per suggestion from Ranjib on Reef2Reef.com. I also added a DPDT momentary switch to allow advancing the reversing the fleece manually. Mini Momentary Toggle Switch DPDT 3 Position 6 Pins

• The new house above interfered with the hanger brackets so I narrowed them. The end piece wasn't really needed so I deleted it. I also had little luck with the printed clamp screws. During testing I'm installing and removing the filter quite a bit and they broke off kinda ruining the filter holder. I switched to metal leg levelers from the local hardware store and those work great.

• The horizontal float switches I got are worthless. They both failed almost immediately. I added a diffusor to the inlet component which helped but the second one still quickly failed. I'm now trying one of the vertical type floats to see it they're any better. To that end I added separate mount and nut that plugs into the original sensor mount hole.

• The two lower roller axels contribute too much friction to pulling the fleece. I removed them and replaced them with single centralized roller.

• The d-shaft on the motor roller was too weak so I beefed it up and added a proper M3x4xx5mm threaded insert. If you don't have them already you can get a whole set here: Brass Knurled Nuts Threaded Heat Embedment Nut for Printing 3D Printer

4/3/22 - Another week of wet testing and some more minor tweaks:

• The new vertical floats actually work (at least no failures yet) so I'm sticking with those.
• Added a small hole in the sender mount (Inner) to run the wiring through.
• Add an optional mount for a second outer (opposing) sensor which can be wired in series to cut power when the sump level rises (e.g. the return pump shuts off)
• The new single lower roller works much better so that's a keeper as well.
• Made a few minor changes to the filter holder (top) to move the switch and power port so they don't interfere with the left hanger in the higher positions.
• Wired in the manual switch and a signal wire for integrating it into the Reef-Pi. This will allow the Reef-Pi to monitor the runtime so that I can setup over/under run rules and alerts which can cover the following scenarios:
  • The float switch fails in the ON position and motor keeps running. Reef-pi powers it off and sends and email/txt
  • The float switch fails in the OFF position or the motor fails and the filter overflows. The Reef-Pi powers it off and sends an email/txt
  • The total run time exceeds a TDB threshold and alerts that the roll is getting low.