Ozone questions???

D

djevack

New member
I have a redsea 100 mg and an ASM g3 skimmer, in a 150g tank.

Right not I have my ORP set at 375, is that ok???

the air tube goes into the skimmer's air tube, but the bubbles seem to decrease alot in the skimmer. So I added a spliter, this way the skimmer draws from ozone tube and some outside air. Was that ok??

I have a large bag of carbon on top of the collection cup will that work?and how often to I need to replace this carbon

there arent any fish in the tank yet. Before I add fish must I have all the water from the skimmer pass though active carbon???

thanks,
 
375 mV is a fine target ORP. Something like 350-450 seems typical, although I have been running my ozone flat out for a couple of weeks, and the ORP has not risen much above 325 mV.

the air tube goes into the skimmer's air tube, but the bubbles seem to decrease alot in the skimmer. So I added a spliter, this way the skimmer draws from ozone tube and some outside air. Was that ok??


That sounds good.


Passing the air and water over carbon is technically tricky, but likely beneficial. A few folks don't do it, but most recommend it. I can't say I've figured out an optimal way yet. I use a Coralife ozone reactor, but it isn't an optimal solution, IMO.

I hope to have 3 articles about ozone in reefkeeping magazine for March, April and May that details what it is, how to use it, and what impacts it had on my aquarium.

Anyone else have comments?
 
i noticed almost immediately my water was much clearer, and the tank lost any bad odors at all. Besides for the skimmer, yuck
 
Randy

Coralife ozone reactor

How is the self-leveling device working on his unit ? Is it a mechanical float valve ? Or a depressuing tube ?

Dave

375

Your ORP is fine at that level. What is the dial on the ozonizer set to ?

but the bubbles seem to decrease alot in the skimmer

Your skimmer may be undersized. Usaully when there is to much ozone in the skimmer the bubbles will decrease/collapse. How are the bubbles now with your modification ?

Before I add fish must I have all the water from the skimmer pass though active carbon?

I would, as ozone produces bromine bleach. A good chlorine test kit can be used to tell when to change carbon.

I have a large bag of carbon on top of the collection cup will that work?and how often to I need to replace this carbon

Yes that is fine. How often is when you stick you noise above the air vent and smell ozone :D
 
i have been running ozone for a week now. it is an enaly and puts out 200mg of o3. it is running through a Milwaukee ORP controller. i started slow and it started out about 240 mv. it has peaked as high as 285 but nothing more. this set up was used by one of my club buddies but taken down when he went to Zeovit. the bubbles are starting to collapse in the skimmer but the tank is much cleaner. any ideas as to why i cannot get the orp higher than 285?
 
How is the self-leveling device working on his unit ? Is it a mechanical float valve ? Or a depressuing tube ?


It is just a vent tube that sticks down into the reactor a certain distance, and so air and/or water comes out of it depending on the water level inside the reactor. That part seems to work fine, although any thought of sending the gas effluent out the window (for safety) is ruined because it has a lot of tank water in it.

any ideas as to why i cannot get the orp higher than 285?

That is not unlike my situation, at 290-325 mV, and I don't have a handy explanation. perhaps all the macroalgae in my refugia conspire to keep the redox down. :)
 
<a href=showthread.php?s=&postid=6655796#post6655796 target=_blank>Originally posted</a> by Randy Holmes-Farley
any ideas as to why i cannot get the orp higher than 285?

That is not unlike my situation, at 290-325 mV, and I don't have a handy explanation. perhaps all the macroalgae in my refugia conspire to keep the redox down. :)
Click to expand...

As the popularity of ozone seems to be on the rise, this is the real question that hasn't been answered yet.

Why do some peoples tanks run in the high 300's even without ozone and some, like me, can't get it over 300. I have no macroalgae and am in the same boat as you. I have read the many things that raise ORP in our tanks and I am knocking them off one by one in a search for this answer.
 
Randy

Yah, the same thing, a depressing tube. Water is pumped out of the reactor to the tank via internal air pressure. The tube is just above the effluent. Without the tube the reactor is depressurized if the air gets down to the effluent. Trying to contol the level with just staight air input adjusment wasn't enough. Pete and I invented a second tube, like yours, so the whole reactor did not vent out. You can also get more constant water levels ( less up and down) by adding a needle valve to the little vent tube. When a number of us first played with these things without the vent tube, the whole reactor, 1 cubic ft of air, would vent out. It sounded like a bomb going off, with the tank getting cloudy from the sand blowing all over the place :lol:
 
Billy

Why do some peoples tanks run in the high 300's even without ozone and some, like me, can't get it over 300


In short, it is the way the reefer runs his tank i.e., husbandry, equipment, water changes, lights, etc.. Pushing up the ORP with ozone is like cheating, just like a skimmer :D

I should add things like very efficient skimming, high capacity pumps, high turnover rates , excellent circulation and air/water gas exchange, intense lighting and using a minimum of feeding
 
Thanks Boomer. I think you got something there. Actually, I consider my husbandry above average. 20 % water changes every two weeks. Clean my filters and test weekly. Now water flow.............. you may have something there. I run a Mag 7 and with my calculated head loss, I'm probably below 150 gph. I believe my next step will be to upgrade my return pump. Better water turnover. It never occured to me. Thanks a million. Let you know what happens.

BTW - Sorry for the hijack. Its just I've been taking every opportunity to figure this out. :)
 
We use the enaly with the 200 to 300 mg/hr range o3. We have a turboflotor 5000 and no macro algae. We have been running the 03 for 2 weeks now and maintain the ORP ~420. As soon as we feed, it drops to about 320. After about an hour the controller shuts it off because its back to the normal level. We haven't seen any changes except that our nitrates are >180. I don't believe we over feed the 175 gallon reef. We do 20% water changes every other week. but just noticed the changes. Granted we have not tested for nitrates in 4 months but the last time they were ~40
 
<a href=showthread.php?s=&postid=6658455#post6658455 target=_blank>Originally posted</a> by Billybeau1
Thanks Boomer. I think you got something there. Actually, I consider my husbandry above average. 20 % water changes every two weeks. Clean my filters and test weekly. Now water flow.............. you may have something there. I run a Mag 7 and with my calculated head loss, I'm probably below 150 gph. I believe my next step will be to upgrade my return pump. Better water turnover. It never occured to me. Thanks a million. Let you know what happens.

BTW - Sorry for the hijack. Its just I've been taking every opportunity to figure this out. :)
Click to expand...

In my experience the best upgrade to increase your ORP will be to have a larger skimmer. For skimmer efficiency also by my experience less is more, I have ran tests using different Ozone rates and found that I get better foaming and more consistent with improved ORP using 15 to 30 mg/hr. At levels of 100 or more skimmate seems "burned" and pale and the skimmer looses much of the tensions that keep the bubbles stable. Because all systems and skimmers are different you will need to experiment a bit to find the right level.

Regarding carbon I just run a bag of it at the output of the skimmer's discharge chamber. I also pass the air vented from the skimmer trough an acrylic chamber before venting it.

Randy ? Boomer, I am not familiar with yout reactor but probably a mod of that carbon container may be helful in the design of the reactor vent you guys are talking about.
The chamber is nothing else than a 21/2" acrylic cylinder full of carbon with a foam at the bottom. Air enters the bottom via a 1" bulkhead and exits the top via a hose connected to the outside. Moisture and water condensates in the carbon and is dripped to the bottom of the chamber sides (about 3/4" all around) where a tap can be installed to drain the excess. Effectively the chamber can work to remove excess Ozone and as water / air phase separator column at the same time.
 
j

It is a Ozone reactor, the are not vented, they are air tight. It is air that pumps the water back to the tank. It is skimmers and their vent that needs a carbon cup or the carbon filter you describer.

The vent we are talking about is just a small 2nd effluent line. If you do not have this you need a float switch ( regulates air input) to control the water level. Trying to control the water level by adjusting a air input line and keeping the water at the level at described height, in the link below, is not a fun task;) Sooner or later the water level rises to high or gets to low. A float switch or a very small 2nd effluent line will control the level inside the reactor so the whole volume of air is not evacuated into your tank. I cubic ft of air @ 5- 20 PSI entering your tank in 1 sec is like a bomb going off :lol:

J. below is a DIY type and a high tech form MTC

DYI. This reactor does not have the 2nd small effluent line or a float switch. Usually we mod these type of reactors, with a small 2nd effluent line mad of rigid plastic tube, like that used in a UGF. You just run the tube along side the main effluent, with the small tube/vent just above it. This way only a small amount of air leaves the reactor. The water level rises due to a short pressure drop, builds back up, plugging the vent from air loss, water level slowly drops, vents again, causing the water level to fluctuate a small amount inside the reactor, in a cyclic like event, without losing the whole vol of air of the reactor.
http://www.aloha.net/~hqf/indexdon02reactor.htm

MTC, with float switch, no 2nd effluent required
http://www.marinetechnical.com/page6.html

That is a nice carbon filter, I like it :D
 
Last edited:
Looking at the diagram for the hook up, (http://www.marinetechnical.com/page6.html)
I may have dicovered my problem. I have the O3 generator hooked upto the air pump and the air pump to the skimmer vs. the pump to the O3 generator to the skimmer. I think I will reverse them tomorrow and check the results.
 
Boomer:

Got it, Wouln't the air vented be ladden with Ozone? This is where the Carbon chamber may be helpful I guess.
 
j

The amount of air that leaves the reactor is vary small and has lots of water in it. As I said, it is nothing more than a small water effluent that is pumping back water all the time, until the water level gets below the small tube, then a short burst of air and then the water level rises and starts pumping water again. The air inside the reactor acts like a piston, pushing the water down the reactor towards the bottom and up these tubes to the sump. Both of these lines are usually dumped into a GAC filter, be it air, water/air or just water. The filter just gravity feeds to the sump. I just used PVC filled with GAC, with cotton at the top and bottom, more or less to keep the GAC from leaving the PVC filter. So the two lines are carbon filtered. I do not think your carbon filter could handle all that water, as an air filter, it would end just just like any carbon water filter. But yes yours would work, it would just be draining allot of water.

On another note, I was in error on Leo's reactor. I though he was using float switches. I can't tell by the diagram, the link Murf gave, but it may be his automated system is using some type of air bleed line, which does not have any water, as it would be above the water level, which then would need an air/carbon filter. He shows an air filter with GAC.

I should have added in my post but most know, I'm very big on all water or any air leaving a reactor or skimmer to be run through GAC first.

We used float switches, either mech or electric and then just opened or closed the air input line to the O2/O3 reactor, no by-pass

Murf

Yes. Pump--->O3--->Skimmer or

Air dryer-->Pump--->O3--->skimmer or


Pump--->Air dryer--->O3---Skimmer
 
Got it, Wouln't the air vented be ladden with Ozone?

It is, yes.

I run both the water and the air/water vent effluent into a vertical 2 foot long, 4" nominal PVC pipe that is filled with carbon. The air/water vent line ends about half way down the column of carbon, so the air travelling up has to pass over carbon, and the water travelling down has to pass over carbon.

I've had to mess with it a few times to ensure there is no ozone smell in the basement fish room, and when working properly, I can just detect some odor at the top of the carbon stack, but not in the room overall (whereas previous versions had a strong room smell).
 
Randy

The air/water vent line ends about half way down the column of carbon, so the air travelling up has to pass over carbon, and the water travelling down has to pass over carbon.


Do you have this carbon filter vented at the top, sounds like it. air traveling up and water going down ? You could have run both lines into the top and let both flow through the carbon via gravity and exit the bottom into the sump. The continues flow of water from the main line would wash out any air.
 
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