calcium reactor Quiz

[Tonycip]

For those of you who have 1,I was wonder do you check the effluent coming out of your reactor and if yes how high is the reading.
I just checked mine and it wasn't that high 455ppm.
isn't it supposed to be like double that?
the controller is set for ph of 7.
Now to adjust it higher I would
A) increase flow through the reactor
B) decrease flow through the reactor
C) decrease ph in the reactor
D) increase co2 into the reactor
E)give the reactor several swift kicks!
thanks

 

[Murphs205]

ill go for option E Tony ,,,,,

 

[carman9941]

I think D, but you might have to adjust the flow as well after you add more CO2, I run my PH in the reactor closer to 6.5-6.7 for great results

 

[itZme]

If you want the CA out of the reactor to be higher you need to dissolve more of the media. You can do this a couple ways...
1. slow the flow out of the reactor to give the media more "dwell" time to dissolve.
2. increase the co2 so you have a lower PH inside the reactor and then it will dissolve quicker. (this would be accomplished by lowering your PH controller to 6.7 or 6.5)

With the first one you might end up coming up short on your CA needs. It seems like the best solution would be to lower the controller PH and keep testing to fine tune the drip rate out of the reactor.

After reading all this again it pretty much says what he said in the previous post ^^^

LOL nevermind.

 

[PhilipOSU]

I would say that if your tank calcium levels have been holding constant at a level you are happy with then it would be a combination of B&D similar to what Kevin said.

 

[DaveOSU]

I agree with PhilipOSU; you need to look at what your tank is doing first and foremost. Because you asked the question I presume your reactor is not keeping up with the Ca demand of your tank and you want to know how to increase it's production. I also presume your reactor is running on a controller.

If that is all correct the easiest answer is to lower your reactor ph setting which your controller will respond by adding more CO2.

Changing the flow will also work but is not as straight forward. You need to measure the calcium levels coming out and understand how that relates to the volume of flow. For example: if you double the flow rate and your output Ca remains the same you are effectively adding twice as much calcium by weight...... it never works that easy and again your controller will add more CO2 to keep the ph at your current setting of 7. Usually if you just increase flow you shorten the dwell time in the reactor and the Ca level in the output may drop some at which point it becomes difficult to discern if your adding more or less calcium by weight. Conversely, if your flow through is too fast slowing it down will increase the dwell and Ca reading but you could be adding more or less Ca by weight. I like to run mine at a real fast drip and adjust ph as needed.

Sorry everyone for the long winded response; Tony I hope this helped.