The Waikiki Aquarium - About Our Tour With J. Charles Delbeek

One of the things we were drawn to was the various types of wavemakers or surge devices that they had set up. One type used a plastic container (like a 33 gallon garbage can), a pump to pump water from the tank back up into the container, and an overflow pipe back into the tank. This is known as the "bell-and-siphon method" and in the aquarium industry today goes by various names. One of them is the Carlson Surge Device (CSD), named after Dr. Bruce Carlson who is the Director of the Waikiki Aquarium. It was set up so the water would fill the container and when the water level reached a certain point, it automatically emptied itself back into the tank causing a flow of water and air bubbles back into the tank from the overflow pipe. The other was a "dump bucket" set up. Water was pumped from the tank up into a bucket, when the water would reach a certain level the bucket would tip over pouring the water back into the tank, resulting in a wave motion. We found an article that was published in the Marine Fish Monthly Magazine in August of 1996 by Dana Riddle for information on how you can make a simple surge device based on the bell-and-siphon method that you might find interesting. We want to thank Charles Delbeek for taking time out of his busy schedule to take us on this tour. We highly recommend if you are going to be in the Waikiki area that you stop by the Waikiki Aquarium for an enjoyable, educational and fun excursion, or visit them online to take a virtural tour and check out their many live cams to learn all about the marine animals on exhibit here.