High efficiency Ca Reactor mod

DJ88- I'm happy that it's working out for you! Since I changed my media a month ago, I had a similar "start up" issue with water not flowing through the recirc loop. What happens is that the resistance through new, loose media is so low, that the water would rather pass through it then the little recirc tubing. After a couple hours though, things settle down a little and it starts flowing. You definitely don't want to use smaller than 1/8" id tubing.

Looking foward to your results! Do you have anything to compare it to though? You prolly won't "appreciate" the diff unless you ran without one first lol

GH Sniper- Lots of people make their own, so you should have no problem! (I even could now, after seeing several different designs). The bubble counter is a simple, high-resolution way to relatively measure how much C02 goes into the reactor. It works AFTER a pressure regulator, and a needle valve is used to control the rate. How much CO2 you use depends on several factors, and is a little different for everyone. HTH
 
Playfair,

I was running a different designed DIY Rx. It went through much more CO2 than this one is already. I can see the recirc line working. There is a nice constant flow of water and excess CO2 going through it. It is taking a bit longer to get the pH down to 6.9 as I am only running it at 35-45BPM at the moment. I know that this is due to all the extra water I have in this reactor. I had to add two gallons of salt water to it. lol

GH,

Do lots of reading and I am sure you will learn all of the principles and design needs that are out there for CaRx design and manufacture. Ifyou can build a skimmer. You can build one of these things.
 
Scleractinian - if you use the "subscribe to this thread" button at the bottom of the page you avoid causing everyone else who is already subscribed from coming to the page just to see that you've jumped on board.

Thanks
Blue
 
I was aware of that Blue, but it wouldn't help me find it again. I have subscribed to a great many threads, and post to very few. It's much easier to search threads to which I have posted. I will consider this and try to come up with a better way to do so... the ginko isn't working as advertised.

Please note, however, that your reply to my post had the same effect.

Sorry for any inconvenience that I might have caused.
 
OK, I made this mod to my reactor this weekend. My biggest problem is the extra line doesn't seem to work all the time. The first time after I set it up, the extra CO2, wouldn't come down the line into the tee where the CO2 is injected. I left this for about 6 hours to see if more pressure needed to build up, but nothing happened. Finally I put a larger piece of tubing from the inlet in front of the pump to the tee (I originally only had about a 1/2" piece of airline tubing), I used a 3" piece this time and it started to pull from the top and mix with the CO2 line as well. But then later in the day, I replaced my tubing from the feeder pump. When I started it back up, the line wouldn't drain again. This morning I pulled the line out at the tee, while it was running, and after about a cup of water sprayed out I put it back and the line would drain again.

Hopefully if I can get it to consistently drain, this will help me get some more life out of my dual chambered coralhound reactor.
 
JB, by any chance did you also change out your media this weekend? Sometimes a fresh batch has too little resistance to force the water/gas through the small tubing. It should run consistant after a few days. This turned into a problem for me once I switched the Mag2 to an Eheim 1060 (less flow).

If you want to make a change, I would leave the line from the T to the pump input small (better bubble mixing), but try fitting a larger ID tubing from the top of the rxr to the T. Then once the flow has started, you can throttle it back with a pinch valve so you only run the required stream of water through the recirc line.
 
I did change out the media last weekend. I'll see if it settles in over the next few days.

Cool mod.
 
You can also manually prime the recirc line by sucking on it and getting all the air out of it...then it works just fine

Greg
 
Great idea Playfair:thumbsup:
I have a lifereef and this mod will fit greately in it.
I have one question, do you think regular silicone airline tubing (it is an airline tubing that wonÃ"šÃ‚´t kink and stays soft all the time) will work for using it for the recirc line?? also I have regular plastic "T"Ã"šÃ‚´s that I can use with the airline tubing, will these work too?
IÃ"šÃ‚´m asking because I donÃ"šÃ‚´t know if the airline tubing has the correct diameter and also because I remember reading somewhere that the co2 would disolve regular plastics:confused:
Thanks
Marco
 
Marco,

all I use is the same type of tubing that is used on the rest of the reactor. the Vinyl tubing stuff.. :)
 
Let's get this thread back to the top.

I have a "DJ88" reactor with the re-circulation loop installed. THere is also a valve on the recirc line to limit the amount of water that bypasses the media. I am having a problem with the CO2 not disolving and excess accumulating in the chamber.

While the reactor circulation pump(eheim 1250) was on, the excess at the top of the reactor was taken care of, however, there was quite a bit of co2 at the bottom of the 2nd stage. I have the tube installed that is supposed to let the excess here go back to the top, but the surface tension of the bubbles was not allowing it all to get out of there.

When I turned off the recirc pump, there was a lot of bubbles trapped in the media that rose to the top. I would say a good 1/4" at the top of the reactor. I was running at about 70 bpm and the effluent ph was 6.7. I kept cranking up the co2 trying to get the ph down. Obviously, the co2 was not being fully utilized.

I shut off the co2 and am allowing the excess to get used up. I was letting the reactor run at least 12 hrs between each change.


How can I get this set so it does not happen again?
 
acrosteve, i have the same problem and i haven't fix the problem with the recirculation line. The co2 bubble just stays on top of the reactor chamber but I was able to reduce the amount of co2 bubbles trapped in the media by turning down the bubble rate. Many recommended to tap the recirculating line directly to the input of the pump. So you would three lines feeding into the input of the pump...the co2 supply, the recirculating line and the water supply from the main tank. I haven't tried it yet but i think it will work.
 
I have the 3 lines you mention entering my system before the pump in a venturi. There is quite a suction there.

Are you saying that you have excess co2 building up before you get the PH low enough? That is the problem I am having.

This is a great mod though. I can imagine how bad this could be if I did not have it. Actually, all I would have to do is to shut of the valve I have, but I just keep it open a little bit.

Anyway, I wonder how we can get this co2 in solution with the water better?
 
Hey guys!
Are the reactors you are running using reverse flow (bottom up)?
If so, I don't think there's much you can do about gas getting trapped in the media or bottom, that happens all the time in the POS Korallin reactor in use on the public tank.
 
Mine is two stage. Stage 1 bottom up, stage 2 top down. The co2 at the top is taken care of with this mod, but I have some co2 accumulating at the bottom of stage two. Just above the intake for the recirculating pump.

So, you think this would be "normal"?
 
Hi Guys
please help, who has the same method 'feeding CR by cool water from chiller?
is it any affect to CR result if compared w/normal NSW (80.6F) from maintank ??
 
I havent idea, just thinking .....why some reefers do the feed from out of chiller. Thank you
any other opinion may be??
 
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