N/P reducing pellets (solid vodka dosing)
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bluereefs
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Well my DIY reactor is a still mirical reactor, lol, after aprox 48 hours he drop nitrates to 10 mg/lit, skimmer work much more stronger, bacteria are in aquarium, reactor wall,corals ... water are more clearer, no bacterial bloom. All of that with very small amount of used bp (300-400 ml) on 150 g aquarium.
Picture latter.
It will be good if someone have some old calcium reactor and can imitate my design for testing, if my results come from diferent design then that will be very good for people who wont to use bp, first it work 100 % , second can be used very small amount of bp to get the results. Only what is needed are old reef octopus ca reactor without pump, just the body, or any similar ca reactor.
More I look and trying to understend why I have so much succes with my diy reactor more I am sure that is due to diferent fluidizing efect I get with him.
Picture latter.
It will be good if someone have some old calcium reactor and can imitate my design for testing, if my results come from diferent design then that will be very good for people who wont to use bp, first it work 100 % , second can be used very small amount of bp to get the results. Only what is needed are old reef octopus ca reactor without pump, just the body, or any similar ca reactor.
More I look and trying to understend why I have so much succes with my diy reactor more I am sure that is due to diferent fluidizing efect I get with him.
Rwpdunne
spsaholic
TheFishMan65
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They can, I think I read the small one won't hold a liter of the N/P pellets. You'll have yo read back through.
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bluereefs
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bluereefs
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This is how I know (besides nitrates drop) that my bp works, if skimmer work like that then bp are activated and working, IMO
48 hours after I ad my diy reactor skimmer start to work much much more stronger
This time I did not alow that water go out from reactor from the top, all water go uot throu regular outlet positioned straight to skimmer intake. There are visiblle bacteria on the top of water, also there are inside the reactor body
There is much more bacteria string on the aquarium glass today
Conclusion, this diy reactor do more in 48 hours with 300 ml of bp then my standard fluidized reactror with 1000 ml of bp who work for months there without results, actually even worse nitrates rises from 0 to 25 mg/lit during his work. Diy reactor drop them to 10 mg/lit in 48 hours.
Next experiment will be moving this diy reactor with minimal amount of bp (100 ml) to third aquarium, to see will he work on 150 g with only 100 ml of bio pellets.
48 hours after I ad my diy reactor skimmer start to work much much more stronger
This time I did not alow that water go out from reactor from the top, all water go uot throu regular outlet positioned straight to skimmer intake. There are visiblle bacteria on the top of water, also there are inside the reactor body
There is much more bacteria string on the aquarium glass today
Conclusion, this diy reactor do more in 48 hours with 300 ml of bp then my standard fluidized reactror with 1000 ml of bp who work for months there without results, actually even worse nitrates rises from 0 to 25 mg/lit during his work. Diy reactor drop them to 10 mg/lit in 48 hours.
Next experiment will be moving this diy reactor with minimal amount of bp (100 ml) to third aquarium, to see will he work on 150 g with only 100 ml of bio pellets.
jlinzmaier
Premium Member
Blue reefs.
Your findings are quite interesting. It clearly sounds like the use of a minimal amount of BP's in your DIY reactor creates far more bacterial growth in the tank and the skimmer seems to produce far more skimmate, but how have the corals responded?? How about the fish or any other animals??
Has the growth of algea (macro or micro) changed in any way after you create these significant drops in nitrate??
Do you use ozone injection?? If so, where is the ozone injected and with what equipment is it utilized??
If your readings are correct, it sounds like you've had drastic drops in nitrate levels in quite a short amount of time. Many corals are quite sensitive to such significant changes in nutrient levels over a quick period of time and I'm surprised you haven't reported any ill effects on the corals from these significant changes.
Have you noticed any change in polyp extension or coloration in any of your corals??
Can you give a brief explanation of the primary component that is different about your DIY reactor vs any other ones you've used (higher flow rate, lower flow rate, continual BP tumbling, little to no BP tumbling, recirc pump, etc....)???
Can I ask how you've gotten such elevated nitrates in the first place?? I've seen many neglected tanks (overfed and underfiltered), but rarely have I seen a tank with nitrate levels above a hundred with any living corals and/or without a significant amount of nuisance algea growth. Maybe I've misread, but it sounds like you've had several tanks that you've had nitrates up and over a hundred and this really surprises me. In the pictures I've seen of your tanks, the corals seem to be in good health and there doesn't seem to be much algea growth at all. This makes me think there may be a nitrate testing anomaly occurring and you may not be getting accurate results. I mean no disrespect, just trying to understand the significant nutrient fluctuations your reporting.
Thanks.
Jeremy
Your findings are quite interesting. It clearly sounds like the use of a minimal amount of BP's in your DIY reactor creates far more bacterial growth in the tank and the skimmer seems to produce far more skimmate, but how have the corals responded?? How about the fish or any other animals??
Has the growth of algea (macro or micro) changed in any way after you create these significant drops in nitrate??
Do you use ozone injection?? If so, where is the ozone injected and with what equipment is it utilized??
If your readings are correct, it sounds like you've had drastic drops in nitrate levels in quite a short amount of time. Many corals are quite sensitive to such significant changes in nutrient levels over a quick period of time and I'm surprised you haven't reported any ill effects on the corals from these significant changes.
Have you noticed any change in polyp extension or coloration in any of your corals??
Can you give a brief explanation of the primary component that is different about your DIY reactor vs any other ones you've used (higher flow rate, lower flow rate, continual BP tumbling, little to no BP tumbling, recirc pump, etc....)???
Can I ask how you've gotten such elevated nitrates in the first place?? I've seen many neglected tanks (overfed and underfiltered), but rarely have I seen a tank with nitrate levels above a hundred with any living corals and/or without a significant amount of nuisance algea growth. Maybe I've misread, but it sounds like you've had several tanks that you've had nitrates up and over a hundred and this really surprises me. In the pictures I've seen of your tanks, the corals seem to be in good health and there doesn't seem to be much algea growth at all. This makes me think there may be a nitrate testing anomaly occurring and you may not be getting accurate results. I mean no disrespect, just trying to understand the significant nutrient fluctuations your reporting.
Thanks.
Jeremy
daveonbass
New member
bluereefs: are you using a "brand new" bag of pellets ech time you change the tank that your diy reactor is on? The reason I ask is because if the pellets in the diy reactor are all the same ones, then to me you haven't shown much, except that those pellets are "still" working. The only way I wouldbe convinced that the diy reacor is legit...would be to move it to a tank that has never had any pellets on it, and to set it up with #rand new" pellets from the manufaturer. Otherwise you're just moving a working system from tank to tank...but we already KNEW it worked.
bluereefs
New member
Actually this time water did not go out from the top so in this experiment we remove the chance that posible bacterial development come from water what are not directed to the skimmer intake. Also is smaller bp amount, reactor are completly washed very carefully to remove all bacteria strings, old sea water are drained and bp was almost dry when I move diy reactor to this aquarium. I ditch playing with fluidized reactor and will concetrate more in various combination with diy, first I get fast results from who I can learn more (bacterial bloom duration, variable flow, variable amounts, efects on nitrates in given period of time, many many thing what can give me better explanation and posibly find the best usage of bp) so instead of losing months trying to figouring why my standard fluid reactor dont have so fast and drastic efects I will experiment only with diy. If in my next experiment 100 ml of bp work fast and eficiency in 150 g aquarium IMO that will open completly new perspective for bp, I used 2500 ml of bp before without significant results.
Jlinzmaier
but how have the corals responded?? How about the fish or any other animals??
Fish do not care, did not see any change or stress during all bacterial bloom in various aquarium, swim and eat as usual, no white spot... Regarding corals, first keep in mind this is all new to me as well for all of us, so I learn more every time I experiment with the bp. I never had bacterial bloom before so I did know nothing about that.
When I had first bacterial bloom with diy reactor, acropora retract polyps, as well as seriatopora, pocilopora (seriatopora/pocilopora react imideatly in my other aquariums during other bacterial blooms retracting polyps almost completly) also lps was not so open and closed more as days pass, they was start to look bad so I removed the bp and made water changes. That was my first expirience with bp bacterial bloom, that time I use aprox 1500 ml of bp in diy reactor. After water changes in next 48 hours most of them completly recover and look perfect, sps corals start to grow like they are on steriods (maybe they try to tell me : dont do this again OK, we will grow LOL).
My conclusion is that bp remove way to fast nitrates ( I already write that) from 100 mg/lit to 0,2 mg/lit in few days. That was to fast to not create stress on corals. I did not expect that because there was time when I use 2500 bp and dose 12 ml of vodka without results.
During second experiment on second aquarium, also with bacterial bloom,most afected corals was gorgonia what is normal and is happening again in my third aquarium because tons of bacterial string atach to gorgonia surface, she are of course closed completly. Fungia, zoanthus, catalaphyllia was not open completly, favia favites on the other hand do not care at all. That can be more due to light intensity then what actually have relation with bacterial bloom. In that aquarium I have dimable T5 and in the evening when light go down but are still on I see same efects like when I had bacterial bloom, lps corals retract tentacle, favia favites open. During bacterial bloom of course visibilty and light intensity was very weak. In this aquarium I did not have negative reaction like in first one (lps coral bleaching due to sudden removal of nitrates) probably because there was less nitrate in the begining , 50 mg/lit and I remove 500 ml of bp from the reactor.
Now is third experiment with third aquarium, this time I use less bp, less flow, there is no cloudy bacterial bloom (at least for now) but there are tons of bacteria strings on gorgonia, aquarium glass, this was biggest and fattest bacterial string I saw, in previous aquarium they was more tiny and smaller. Afected corals are gorgonia and pocilopora, they are closed without polyps expansion, other corals (bubble, catalaphyllia, acanthastrea, ...) are ok but not so expanded as usual. Fishes (hepatus, anthias dispar, mandarin, wrasess) and stenopus hispidus shrimp swimm as nothing hapening.
Has the growth of algea (macro or micro) changed in any way after you create these significant drops in nitrate??
Yes, first bacterial bloom in first aquarium, wipe them out completly, he wipe out everything organic in this aquarium IMO, they completly disapear, even few days after bp removal glass was crystal clear. In second aquarium also most of the algae gone in very short time, caulerpa was wiped out, desintegrate. Will see efect in third aquarium, is with bp only for 3 days.
In all of my aquariums I did not have much algae, actually barelly algae at all on reef keramik, most was on pvc pipes/overflow and glass.
Do you use ozone injection?? If so, where is the ozone injected and with what equipment is it utilized??
No nothing, not even activated carbon are used on 2 aquarium, just what you see in picture, skimmer and bp
If your readings are correct, it sounds like you've had drastic drops in nitrate levels in quite a short amount of time. Many corals are quite sensitive to such significant changes in nutrient levels over a quick period of time and I'm surprised you haven't reported any ill effects on the corals from these significant changes.
Yes, I reported ill efects, some trachyphyllia bleached out, now they are in the shades and slowly recover. That was hapening only during my first bacterial bloom. Of course so suden removal of nitrates are not good. To fast.
Have you noticed any change in polyp extension or coloration in any of your corals??
Yes they are all perfect after I remove the bp from aquarium, lol, I am not so much in sps corals, I have mostly lps corals so there is no color changes ( besides bleaching) Some sps corals get more lighter colours but because I start to feed heavy again (to recover the lps corals from suden nutrients removal) nitrates rise to 25 mg/lit so more or less they have same colours, but grow much more faster. Here are picture, I am very bad with taking pictures, alive corals are more better looking
you can see bleached trachyphyllia in right corner
Can you give a brief explanation of the primary component that is different about your DIY reactor vs any other ones you've used
Uff, it will be hard to expalain with my English language skill. There are 2 primary diference, first is open top, dont know is that afecting or not bp perfomanse but that is diference, who know maybe aces to air/co2 removal actually benefit bacteria somehow. Second are diferent vortex efect in the bottom of the reactor, as you can see in video, water does not enter the reactor as she enter in standard fluid reactor, mostly water are forced from the top hit the reactor bottom and then go upward making fluzidization, in my diy is diferent, water go from the side of reactor throu pipe, pipe have angle on the end and that create vortex efect in first compartment, my fluidizitaion look like 2 piles of sand what are mixed together, one pile go down and second pile go up. Is hard to explain, please check the video
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=s-J4NUkzv8k
Components are reef octopus CR100
http://coralvue.com/cr100/ my model are litlle diferent, dont have angled pipe at the top of reactor , removed the pump, the top and CO2 pipes
eheim return pipe,( cuted) http://www.aquariumguys.com/widereturn1.html
eheim valve http://www.aquariumguys.com/stopcock2.html
and hagen powerhead, 404, that was old model, now they are called 70 http://www.hagen.com/uk/aquatic/product.cfm?CAT=1&SUBCAT=119&PROD_ID=01005700030101
I just cut the return pipe, leave the angle on her, put the pipe throu the bottom of reactor, put valve and conect to the powerhead, that is.
Can I ask how you've gotten such elevated nitrates in the first place??
First I did not change the water for months, that was my bad because water changes are best what we can do for aquarium, but it hapenned, to much personal life. And what elevated nitrates the most are tubastrea and non photo corals. I get such a beautiful tubastrea and she did not open, I feed her way to much trying to open her, without succes, I do not use profesional frozen food but my home made blenderized sea shrimp, fish, squeed... that is much more concetrated food then profesional products what are IME mostly water, there was days when I use 4-5 boxes of that food, IMO each of my home made food box is equivalent to 3-4 aquarium frozen food boxes. Then in the begining of this thread are collagen, joghurt and other experiment what I also using, at the end tubastrea is gone and I am left with 100 mg/lit nitrates.
but rarely have I seen a tank with nitrate levels above a hundred with any living corals and/or without a significant amount of nuisance algea growth.
Yup, that was weird for me too, most of my sps corals grow from tiny frags glued to ceramick, here you can see growth and abscense of algae
here is aquarium with 100 mg/lit nitrates
here is start before year and 3 month (15 months ago)
Maybe I've misread, but it sounds like you've had several tanks that you've had nitrates up and over a hundred and this really surprises me
No, only main get 100 + mg/lit nitrates, second get 25 mg/lit (that was suprised me because that aquarium use 1000 ml of bp and nitrates rise from 0 to 25 mg/lit), third have 50 mg/lit nitrates, no water changes for months, 5 at least due to personal life.
This makes me think there may be a nitrate testing anomaly occurring and you may not be getting accurate results
No, I have 2 salifert test and they show same results, I test natural sea water and get zero results, also they show me nitrates drop so I asume they are precise as much as they can be. It is something I do not understend also but I have diferent system how I made aquarium, very litlle decoration, only reef keramik, no live rock at al, no refugium, dsb, or anything similar what can trap detritus, very open aquascape what not alow detritus acumulation, strong and fast return pump, strong skimmer, fast overflow... al of that do not allow detritus acumulation, co2 is removed fast, no ph drop... that is what IMO create algae problem not nitrates itself, if you check my sumps you will see they are totally clear, almost 0 detritus are in sump after 15 months of usage
I mean no disrespect, just trying to understand the significant nutrient fluctuations your reporting.
No problem at all, I just share information, maybe someone find them interesting, if they can understend them lol.
daveonbass
New member
so you still use the same "successful" pellets. I don't want to be rude, but that's just not experimental. Nor is it evidence that the diy reactor has anything to do with it. You need to either use brand new bp in the diy reactor each time you try something new, or try putting all the working bp from diy reactor into an older reactor that wasn't working as well. Otherwise we still are no closer to understanding what really does work.
daveonbass
New member
dude, it's simple. Don't use the already successful bp. Just dump them out and use the ones that haven't worked as well. IF they work suddenly in the diy reactor, then you may have something. But even then this is not a closed/controled experiment. You have too many unaccounted for variables. But using different/new/less successful bp would be the place to start.
bluereefs
New member
Sorry Dave but I do not understend why would I waste my time changing bio pellets for dry bio pellets who are the same pellets what I used before without results? That are same pellets, I mix the pellets from not working reactors in this diy reactor, I already washed this bio pellets completly under the freshwater stream after my second bacterial bloom ( I dont think bacteria can tolerate or survive vigorous washing with freshwater) part of them I dry and put aside, rest I put again in diy reactor and get same efect. So why would I again remove the bp from this reactor and change them for same bio pellets ? I already do that. I have aprox 2500 ml of bp, 1300 are in use, rest I dryed. They are not cheap and I do not wont to spent more money to get what I already have.
daveonbass
New member
I'm saying...empty the diy...clean the diy if you want...then fill it with bp from a reactore that "doesn't" seem to be working. Then see if they magicly start to work. The purpose is to see if you have a successful "batch" of bp, or if you have a successful reactor.
The reverse test could be made by putting the successful bp into the not so successful reactor...and see if either the bp stop working (reactors fault) or keep working (reactor doesn't matter as much and it's all about getting successful bp).
The reverse test could be made by putting the successful bp into the not so successful reactor...and see if either the bp stop working (reactors fault) or keep working (reactor doesn't matter as much and it's all about getting successful bp).
daveonbass
New member
is that a recirc design? It goes in at the bottom and out at the top...where is it recurculating the water? And I'm not saing it's NOT the reactor. I just wish he would test for that.
bluereefs
New member
I think we lost somewhere, probably due to my bad English language. I do that, that is how I start. I used bp in the diy reactor for 4-5 months without efect, but in that time he do not fluidized and he was closed so he was flow throu reactor . Together with this reactor I used another octopus fluidized reactor with 500 ml of bp on same aquarium. No efects no nitrates drop. So one day I just decide to change something because usage so far do not have efects. I washed the bp (same bp already used for months), also washed bp from octopus reactor and put them in diy reactor (same bp already used in fluid reactor for months), clean/washed diy reactor with the freshwater completly, remove the top, instal valve so I can fluidize bp, put him back on same aquarium, get bacterial bloom 24 hours latter. Same bio pellets was used for months without efects, only changes are diy reactor modification (open top and fluidization).
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