Lanthanum chloride

i would like to get ten ,and am in syracuse but i can come to you without a problem .when are you going to order them ? how do you want me to pay ,when i pick them up is the easiest for me but i do understand that you wouldn't enjoy getting stiffed so let me know . you can PM me if you like .
thanks Dave
 
Anybody know where in Rochester they sell seaklear. Been to a couple shops and all I get is "This should be the same thing"
 
I stopped using lanthanum on my system recently due to a few things:

1) Ethanol and vinegar dosing finally catching up with the bioload of the tank--12 mL of 95% ethanol (or 29 mL of vodka) per 300g daily.
2) Regeneration of GFO with NaOH--I use about 2L of GFO on this system (dual BRS reactor) and can regenerate a liter every 2 weeks. This has brought down the cost dramatically. Perhaps not as cheap as lanthanum, but much more reasonable.

I was never happy with the reaction I observed in sponges and the maintenance associated with the filter sock cleaning when dosing lanthanum.
 
tmz said:
Curious . What reaction did you see from the sponges?
Click to expand...

Death. :strange:

Even when I dosed it slow over the course of 12 hours it killed it. So I added some more sponge, looked fine, and then same result upon the next lanthanum dose. For whatever reason it only affected that sponge in the system, a couple white and lavender sponges appeared unaffected.

This guy originally grew out of a little nub into a tennis ball sized colony in an NPS tank. This is what it looked like about 3 years ago.

DSC00768.jpg
 
Matt_Wandell said:
I stopped using lanthanum on my system recently due to a few things:

1) Ethanol and vinegar dosing finally catching up with the bioload of the tank--12 mL of 95% ethanol (or 29 mL of vodka) per 300g daily.
2) Regeneration of GFO with NaOH--I use about 2L of GFO on this system (dual BRS reactor) and can regenerate a liter every 2 weeks. This has brought down the cost dramatically. Perhaps not as cheap as lanthanum, but much more reasonable.

I was never happy with the reaction I observed in sponges and the maintenance associated with the filter sock cleaning when dosing lanthanum.
Click to expand...
interesting post, Matt.

I agree that filter sock maintenance is a PITA.
I haven't observed any decrease of sponges in my system, however.
(note that I haven't been dosing ethanol, vinegar or using GFO.)

Lanthanum chloride doses have decreased here over time as it takes much less of it to maintain low PO4 nowadays.
 
If anything the other sponges in the same system thrived after the treatment, so I am really at a loss to explain any mechanism for why it killed the one species of sponge. Sometimes I wish I had such a good species specific eradication technique for other animals in reef systems!

Curious as to folks' thoughts on the GFO regeneration. Anyone tried it? Seems like it should make LaCl dosing nearly obsolete on all but the very largest home systems.
 
Yes. I've been doing the regenration for a few months. Acid bath(vinegar) then lye soak. I use the brs HC gfo which is pretty hard and dust free and it tolerates the process well. It does degrade a bit each time producing some fines though and will eventually become unusable . I've used some of it 4x over and should get a few more. In total I'm using about a liter and a half on the system.
I also dose vodka and vinegar and have done so for just about 20 months with good results. I tried sugar earlier and some corals reacted poorly. I dose 26 ml of 40 proof vodka and 64 ml of vinegar which equals 8ml of vodka , a total 34 ml vodka equivalents for 550 gallons /about .062 ml per gallon. Your 29 mil for 300g is about 55% higher at .096ml per gal. I guess I have a little room if I need it but all systems are different. I use chaeto refugia and lots of extra live rock too for example. How much vinegar do you use BTW? Have you observed any adverse effects or side benefits from the carbon dosing? Ph dropped to a pretty constant 7.95 to 8.15 from a previous 8.2 to 8.35 .Sponge growth improved for me along with zoanthus growth. Perhaps the extra bacteria or acetate are helping . I'm very happy with NO3 at a consistent 0.2ppm to 0.5ppm and phosphate at 0.05ppm or less. Runmning lessgfo than before and changing it less frequently.

I still tweak with small amounts of lanthanum 5ml to 10ml for the 550 gallons Seaklear 50% solution with ro water whenever I note the PO4 over 0.05ppm which happens every 2 weeks or so as a reactor may clog or need changing and the level creeps to .07 or rarely to .08. Lanthanum does a nice job when curing phosphate laden rock too cutting the one year "cooking process" to weeks with no water changes needed along the way.

I did notice a large yellow sponge similar to yours but less bright shrivelled a bit after the last 10ml dose. The other sponges including encrusting yellow are fine. Could be coincidence but it is why I asked what happened to yours.Maybe some lanthanum got into the waer columm and precipitation to lanthanum phosphate occured there clogging the sponge and maybe this type of porifera has paryicularly fine pores.
 
update

update

every time I look at my reef aquarium I recall how thankful I am for this discovery (ie: the dosing of lanthanum chloride).
I feed a lot of animals (both large and small) and yet I'm able to easily keep PO4 levels extremely low. Sponge growth has not been a problem.
Tridacna clams and other mollusks appear to be at the highest risk if LaCl3 is improperly dosed or abused.

I'm still using the same bottle of LaCl3 that I purchased at the top of this thread (October 2008) two years ago!
Obviously, a little bit goes an extremely loooooong way.

September2010a.jpg
 
Last edited:
Gary, I've been using LC dosed into a pool DE filter, all plumbed into my 600g system, and all automated! The filter turns on for an hour every 12 hrs and drips LC into it. I backwash it once a week and recharge the DE. It keeps my phosphates very low and polishes my water like nothing else. I've been running this for some time now, working out the bugs, and plan to start a thread soon with drawings to outline the setup. I too am sold on LC, absolutely no problems with livestock and very reasonable to run. I chose a pool DE filter to catch the LC precipitate and it's large enough to run my next large build :)
 
it sounds like you have a very nice system, E.

The water polishing effect is something I don't often mention.
This method of PO4 reduction is very effective as well as cost effective.
There might come a point when you only have to run your phosphate remover once a week instead of once every 12 hours.
 
Gary Majchrzak said:
it sounds like you have a very nice system, E.

The water polishing effect is something I don't often mention.
This method of PO4 reduction is very effective as well as cost effective.
There might come a point when you only have to run your phosphate remover once a week instead of once every 12 hours.
Click to expand...

The DE filter is automatically isolated from the system when not running to avoid leaching of dissolved organics, silica and LC precipitates. However I must run it once or twice a day to prevent a die off of bacteria in the filter, believe me, I learned this the hard way :( Though I don't necessarily need to drip LC every time it runs. For now, the current cycle/dosing is working well.
 
Gary Majchrzak said:
what happens when you allow bacteria to die off in the filter?
Click to expand...

I had my pool DE filter pump go out and it took nearly 5 days before I got it replaced, the filter sat there full the whole time, I started it up and nearly lost all my fish. Within minutes they were gasping rapidly, I ran a TON of carbon and within a few hours everything settled down, I still lost a few fish though. I believe the dying bacteria released toxins that the carbon was able to pull out from the water column. I never let the DE filter sit for more than a day now.
 
something similar can happen when a protein skimmer loses power for an extended period of time and gets turned back on. Thanks for sharing.
 
I haven't needed to run GFO since I started using LaCl3.
I use Lanthanum extremely sparingly (absolute zero PO4 is a big no no!) and I use it in conjunction with water changes (search up the "wet skimming" thread) if I decide to dose it.

Goni2.jpg
 
I agree, also been using the wet skimming method for some time now, so how much LC do you use and how often on average? what phosphate level do you average and do you use a photometer? thanks
 
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