N/P reducing pellets (solid vodka dosing)

[EvMiBo]

I got my TLF150 with MJ1200 today. I ordered 500ml of the biopellets as well. I have question (for people with a TLF150): when you initially added the pellets did they not tumble too much? Mine are kind of clumping up and not moving too much, will this get better over time?

btw- I added them all at once, didn't think there would be a problem.

 

[stevedola]

when i set them up for the 90g the pellets wouldnt tumble unless I shook them a little. they move better after a couple of days. now they move just fine.

 

[EvMiBo]

came home today to find them clumped up. shook it a little, tapped it a couple times for vibration and now they're separated for the most part. Seems to be getting better, like you said.

Started a separate thread in the chemistry forums here if anyone cares to check it out (pics + vids): http://reefcentral.com/forums/showthread.php?t=1829509

 

[euromomtx]

about that bacteria goop:
Initially I had a lot of stringy bacteria stuff. Now not so much. Is it an indication of anything to have a reduction of bacteria goop?

 

[ChuckG]

about that bacteria goop:
Initially I had a lot of stringy bacteria stuff. Now not so much. Is it an indication of anything to have a reduction of bacteria goop?

I would think an established tank would support a larger population of bacteria at first since it would be "dirtier" and have more avalable nutrients for the bacteria to consume. Eventually the bactera will consume enough to limit themselves to a steady state population level. If you were suddenly feed more you might see the popultion increase, then decrease again if you began feeding less.

 

[djneedledamage]

I know what these pellets are made out of. Ha Ha......

 

[thejuggernaut]

Has anyone heard any news on the new next reef reactors designed for these....I have 500ml in a TLF reactor for about a month, and they seem to be doing well at cutting back on the algae growth (can't be sure though cause I am still dosing vodka and MB7).

 

[Keyvan S]

Vertex has two type of reactor design,Vertex UF-15 & UF-20 Reactor
http://www.oceaniccorals.com/store/index.php?_a=viewProd&productId=355

 

[ChuckG]

So I added a BRS reactor and 500ml of biopellets 4 days ago and although it seems a little early I may be seeing some results and thought I'd post them.

My tank is newer in life but I have always dosed MB7.. in fact I had a pretty significant visible bloom of bacteria in the middle of the cycle.

http://web1.reefcentral.com/forums/showthread.php?t=1802494

The tank started off pretty sterile with dry rock so any nutrients in there were carefully monitored and controlled. It finished the cycle with no PO4 or NO3 due to heavy water change and GFO use. Anyway.. after the cycle I added 20 coral frags.. then some number of weeks after adding the frags I added 3 fish. Fish addition was approx 2 weeks ago.

I had been feeding the frags regularly with oysterfeast and would notice some increased algae grow on the glass. MB7 doses made directly to the tank and heavy wet skimming seemed to keep this growth in check. But after adding the fish and feeding them over the last two weeks I have noticed an uptick in algae growth. Specifically some hair algae has started growing on a few frag plugs that it must have rode in on etc.. nothing really out of control yet, but something I was going to have to stop sooner rather than later.

I had planned on lowering PO4 temporarily with GFO until the biopellets kicked in... but 4 days after adding the pellets the algae is clearly dying back. Clearly it seems to soon to see a result from the pellets, but I will reiterate that my tank his heavily seeded with whatever bacteria strains are in MB7. So much so that even before I added the biopellets I could tell the effect heavy doses of it had on diatom growth on the glass.

So I am thinking the high bacteria populations may have rather quickly found their way to the biopellet reactor. The water seems to have cleared up overnight. The skimmer knog is much more dense and stinky... and the tank smells fresher and more like clean ocean water. I have not noticed much of a decline in PH, but with three fish and a bunch of frags I may not have a high enough bio load to support a large enough bacterial colony to saturate the water column with Co2.. especially up against the over sized skimmer. Interesting stuff.. could be anecdotal, but Ill check back with an update as things progress.

 

[chark]

I know what these pellets are made out of. Ha Ha......

Well you going to tell us???

 

[ilikecougars]

TLF 550 reactor

TLF 550 reactor

Well I had this reactor set up for over month now with 1L biopellets. With no foam and only a mesh mod on the bottom plate so that the pellet won't fall thru.
First week useing a mj1200 and the pellets would only bounce around in the reactor.
Second week switch to a aquaclear 70 (about 400 gph) now the pellet would tumble on one side of the reactor and producing a lot of mlum, and would clog the pellets from tumbleing, which each day I would have stir the pellets in the reactor. The TLF 550 reactor top comes off easy without removing any plumbing or twisting the bottom of the reactor. A plus for this reactor. Ran this way for 2 weeks.
Now I have it plumb it to my return line from the sump, (which was less than $10 dollars for fitting). Now the pellets I would said are boiling in the reactor 3/4 to 1" above the level mark of the pellets on one side the reactor and down the other side in circular motion.
I am wonding now, if this is too much flow?

 

[SimonSKL]

Hi from over the pond. Been following this thread and a few of us over here are trialling the pellets, however there seem to be a few issues with skimmer performance.

What we have noticed is that there seems to be two types of pellets about. The earlier ones contain the rounded shaped pellets whereas the later ones contain additional square edged pellets which sink to the bottom after fluidising.

I for one, and a couple others using the latter type have completley lost all skimmer performance with only a fizzing action i.e. no foaming.

Anyone else experienced this?

Regards

About a month ago, HTSL brought the above observation up re different pellet shapes but I didn't believe it was addressed or discussed fully as most US reefers did not seem to encounter the same problem with skimmer at that time.

In the last 3 days, reefers in Hong Kong discovered what appeared to be plastic pellets mixed in with regular biopellets. Many of them complained their skimmers stopped working for days and even weeks after starting the BP. Here are some of the pictures posted in the HK Reef forum showing the different pellets in the same bag.

Those BP sold in HK has Chinese labelling besides the standard label.

Those pellets on the left are the NP Biopellets and those on the right are what HK reefers called plastic pellets.

Some HK reefers even did a burn test to show the two pellets are indeed having different chemical and burn characteristics. See the linked video below.

The video explained the burn test in Chinese. Let me translate. The "plastic pellets" were shown first which are "thicker" than the biopellets. The video separated the biopellets to the left and plastic pellets to the right. In the burn test, the plastic pellet was ignited with a cigarette lighter and it combusted easily on its own. According to the tester, it smelled like burnt plastic. The biopellet did not ignite just melted.

At first many thought it was certain retailers who were scamming the reefers by adding fake pellets to boost profitability but several retailers went to the forum and defended that they purchased the NP Biopellets directly from the authorized distributer.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ozh7CkAh9JU&feature=player_embedded#

When I read about the issue, I remembered HTSL from UK raised the same issue about a month ago so I thought may be the problem is not limited in Hong Kong but originated early in the distribution channel and may be even at the factory. Even with the manufacturing process changed, how can two different pellets ended up into the same bag?

My questions are:
1. Did anyone notice different pellets size in the same bag of your purchase?
2. If you did, how well was your skimmer working after you started the BP?
3. Is there anyway to test and identify the true biopellets?

Personally I have no problem with my BP and my skimmer works as it should. I still have about 500ml of unused BP in the original bag and I did not notice different pellet shapes.

I hope Jean Paul or someone from Aquarium Specialty can give us some insight into this.

 

[tatuvaaj]

SimonSKL,

Thank you for very interesting information! That would certainly explain the contrasting experiences people have had lately.

I haven't seen those "fake" pellets in three batches I've bought.

 

[SimonSKL]

The HK reefers who removed the "plastic pellets" reported skimmer function returned within a couple hours!

 

[AquariumSpecialty]

About a month ago, HTSL brought the above observation up re different pellet shapes but I didn't believe it was addressed or discussed fully as most US reefers did not seem to encounter the same problem with skimmer at that time.

In the last 3 days, reefers in Hong Kong discovered what appeared to be plastic pellets mixed in with regular biopellets. Many of them complained their skimmers stopped working for days and even weeks after starting the BP. Here are some of the pictures posted in the HK Reef forum showing the different pellets in the same bag.

Those BP sold in HK has Chinese labelling besides the standard label.

Those pellets on the left are the NP Biopellets and those on the right are what HK reefers called plastic pellets.

Some HK reefers even did a burn test to show the two pellets are indeed having different chemical and burn characteristics. See the linked video below.

The video explained the burn test in Chinese. Let me translate. The "plastic pellets" were shown first which are "thicker" than the biopellets. The video separated the biopellets to the left and plastic pellets to the right. In the burn test, the plastic pellet was ignited with a cigarette lighter and it combusted easily on its own. According to the tester, it smelled like burnt plastic. The biopellet did not ignite just melted.

At first many thought it was certain retailers who were scamming the reefers by adding fake pellets to boost profitability but several retailers went to the forum and defended that they purchased the NP Biopellets directly from the authorized distributer.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ozh7CkAh9JU&feature=player_embedded#

When I read about the issue, I remembered HTSL from UK raised the same issue about a month ago so I thought may be the problem is not limited in Hong Kong but originated early in the distribution channel and may be even at the factory. Even with the manufacturing process changed, how can two different pellets ended up into the same bag?

My questions are:
1. Did anyone notice different pellets size in the same bag of your purchase?
2. If you did, how well was your skimmer working after you started the BP?
3. Is there anyway to test and identify the true biopellets?

Personally I have no problem with my BP and my skimmer works as it should. I still have about 500ml of unused BP in the original bag and I did not notice different pellet shapes.

I hope Jean Paul or someone from Aquarium Specialty can give us some insight into this.

The BP on the left side of your photo are the only ones we have seen here in the US. Recently (about 3 weeks ago) we were notified by the exporter that they received in a different batch of BP by mistake (not used for marine aquariums) and they caught the error before they sent it out to us. Fortunately we never received any of the incorrect product (pictured on the right) but purhaps some of it may have slipped through the cracks to an overseas distributor. Either that happened or someone overseas is trying to pull a fast one. JP can probably shed more light on this but I'm almost certain eveyone in the US has the correct product as long as it was purchased from a USA NP Biopellets dealer.

 

[tntneon]

thanks for the shocking news SimonSKL,
it`s a shame that some folks try to make a quick buck on the account of a new upcomming product and thus under mining the product credibility !!!

Shame on the guy(s) who are doing this...:furious: (<--- it`s the first time i used this bady).

Luckely there was no real harm done so far , besides the reduced skimmer production.

i hope that this kind of fraude will be invested and stopped !!!


greetingzz tntneon

 

[SimonSKL]

The BP on the left side of your photo are the only ones we have seen here in the US. Recently (about 3 weeks ago) we were notified by the exporter that they received in a different batch of BP by mistake (not used for marine aquariums) and they caught the error before they sent it out to us. Fortunately we never received any of the incorrect product (pictured on the right) but purhaps some of it may have slipped through the cracks to an overseas distributor. Either that happened or someone overseas is trying to pull a fast one. JP can probably shed more light on this but I'm almost certain eveyone in the US has the correct product as long as it was purchased from a USA NP Biopellets dealer.

Scott, thanks for the information. Many HK reefers who purchased the BP with only the standard label (i.e no Chinese label) reported that there were no mixed pellets in the bag and their skimmers function normally. It looks like this might be a manufacturing error at the factory and the wrong product eventually exported to other parts of the world but US. I hope this error did not result in major loss of aquatic lives in reefers' tanks. If the product has been manipulated downstream in the distribution channel, a better or more secured packaging is in order. I think the ziplock bag type of packaging is too easy for someone to manipulate the product.

 

[pterfloth]

I have a few of the "plastic" pellets in my recent purchase of 3 bags of NP pellets in Canada. They look exactly like in the picture and are mixed in with the regular pellets.

My skimmer has not been affected, but I am now a little concerned.

 

[DJREEF]

China. Need I say more.

DJ

 

[SimonSKL]

China. Need I say more.

DJ

This started a few weeks ago in UK. I hope you have read what Scott from Aquarium Specialty said about the error a few posts back. We don't know the source of the error yet.