So who is carbon dosing? Pellets, Vodka, Vinegar, or Vitamin C

[ERivera65]

Hey guys, just curious to see who is carbon dosing, what they are dosing, and how much? Also please list your tank size and filtration. I have read pros and cons about the several forms of carbon dosing but i want to see and hear everyones experiences. Thanks

 

[Gillguy]

Hey guys, just curious to see who is carbon dosing, what they are dosing, and how much? Also please list your tank size and filtration. I have read pros and cons about the several forms of carbon dosing but i want to see and hear everyones experiences. Thanks

This topic has been discussed for years. Some like it and some don't. I swear by it. I've dosed for seven years now and followed the dosing on the link below. I did initially go through a bit of cyno but it went away after a few weeks. I noticed a big difference about two weeks into the schedule. I went up as high as 15 ml and now dose daily 12ml. Don't know if you have read these but here are two links. Oh, I have a 120 mixed reef with a small refugium and berlin style sump. You can also search RC for vodka or vinegar and you'll get many threads.

http://www.melevsreef.com/vodka_dosing.html

http://reefkeeping.com/issues/2008-08/nftt/index.php

 

[Biggar]

Dosing 60-70ml vinegar daily in 260 gallons volume. Also running about 2 cups of biopellets in bluefin reactor. I do have lil cyano, but only in the refugium. Been about 5 months. Not sure if either are working. Nitrates stuck at 5ppm.

***I will add that I recently added 1 more cup of pellets to make 2 total and new pump, pushing about 800 GPH now in the reactor. Could be just what the tank wanted. Time will tell.

 

[rovster]

Was dosing 2mL Vinegar into 30 gallons. I probably could have gone higher, but things were looking real good. I decided to overcomplicate things, so I added Vodka at a comparable dose, and immediately got cyano. I cut the dose in half and am slowly ramping back up. The cyano is still there but almost nonexistent. My nitrates were stuck in the 20+ range, and after about a month, slowly came down to the 5 range. Now they are hovering at just barely there. I know if I increase the dose I can push them down further, but like I said, things look good so I'm happy where its at. I still run a little GFO to keep the phosphates down. I'm trying to ween off of it but so far, I still need a little.

 

[dadummy]

I dose vinegar, started with bio pellets but they stripped NO3 too rapidly and didn't help with P04.
I have dosed it manually daily, now I mix a small amount in with my kalk top off resevior

 

[DRThompson]

I dose methanol into a chamber to grow bacteria that eats nitrates. Been using this carbon source for over 2 years now. My thread:

http://reefcentral.com/forums/showthread.php?t=2098528&page=2

 

[Blueline12]

Vodka and MB7 dosing for years. Works great.

 

[Fishman7]

vodka 2 ml for 60 gal 1 ml for 30 noth under 10ppm all the time doing it for 2 months now gonna be firing up bio pellets on the 60 soon but might go back old school and fire the denitrator again ??? its a hobby a toy