RE:External Co2 Reactor.

[r4211z]

Hi guys,

Just wondering,
I was doing up my tank yesterday and it's my first external reactor,it's those water filter type modifty to input co2 and a green yube inside.
Top transparent and with a blue base.One input and one output for water and a input for Co2.

Question:
(1) Do you add anymore things inside it ? (ie: bio balls or some media )
(2) Water level first day was 1/4 of the canister, this morning was 1/2 of the canister.Now it's 3/4 full inside the canister. Tommorrow----> hope it don't explode on me.(what's your level.)

Setup is as follows.

Tank-->Eheim 2028-->external reactor--> tank

Thank you guys for your advice.
Best Regards
Jake

[tawauboy]

are you allow maximum flowrate through the reactor?
is the water spinning in the reactor?
what is your bubble rate?
do you inject co2 24/7?

[Rupert]

Hi Jake,
I have an external reactor the same as yours; here is a picture of my setup:


Tank-->Eheim 2028-->Chiller-->external reactor--> tank

It does take a while for all the air to escape, and if I remember correctly about the whole day/night. It takes longer the first time around as there are air bubbles in other pieces of equipment that all end up in the reactor. While there is air inside there is a bit of extra noise as well. When you have your co2 on there will be some space at the very top of the reactor as the CO2 mixes with the water [dependant on BPS], there is no possibility of it exploding.

I do not think any extra bio balls would make any difference in fact I do not think they add anything to the whole process except to possibly impede the water flow. I would remove mine if I could.

Look forward to seeing a picture of your tank set up.

[r4211z]

Here it is, it's almost full already, and the noise had stopped.

Thank you for the advice.
Bio balls looks kind of cool spinning inside there...

[aquarius]

When the Co2 is pumped into the reactor, after some time there will be a gap at the top especially if the BPS is quite high. My question is won't there be a lost/waste of CO2 due to the surface aggitation in the reactor??

I think it'll be better to shorten the green tube in the reactor so as to minimise the surface aggitation.

[r4211z]

The Tube inside, i think it's the same for all those brought from NA?

what i noticed today is that AFTER the water is almost to the top of the canister, i don't seems to see tiny bubbles coming out of the rain bar already.

Yesterday,when the canister is 1/2 and 1/4 full, tiny bubbles can be seen clearly flowing to the plants.It's make it like a sort of cloudly effect.

Today it had stopped.
According to my friend,the CO2 had been atomised and mixed with the water itself.

Dunno how true.

Jake

[grey_fox]

The 'cloudy effect' from the rain bar only happens when the CO2 reactor is first primed, once its filled up, you should not see thousands of bubbles jetting around, however, just a question, what is you BPS (bubble-per-second) rate at the moment?

Whichever the case, you should at least see pearling of your plants within 1 to 2 hours into photo period.

[tawauboy]

When the Co2 is pumped into the reactor, after some time there will be a gap at the top especially if the BPS is quite high. My question is won't there be a lost/waste of CO2 due to the surface aggitation in the reactor??

I think it'll be better to shorten the green tube in the reactor so as to minimise the surface aggitation.

there is loss actually as co2 is not lost to the atmosphere. co2 will eventually get dissolved in the water. the reactor is an enclosed environment.

shortening the green tube is not going to help unless you can unsure that the "gap" will not form.

[alanyeo99]

I don't have this kind of CO2 reactor setup as above. But I had this similar problem of a "gap full of CO2" on the upper portion of the reactor. The way to overcome this is to increase flow-rate. Higher flow-rate flushes out the excess CO2 and prevents buildup. You'll need to do a trial to see what flow-rate is ideal. Increased my powerhead from 400lph to 1,000lph and now the bubble gap is gone.

[BFG]

r4211z, the problem may correct itself. In my case, if it reaches more than half the external reactor volume, overturn the whole reactor to let the co2 out into the tank. My setup has corrected itself. When there is co2 supply, there will be a gap but if the co2 supply is cut off, the co2 gap will be absorbed into the water gradually until there's not a single bubble of co2 left in the reactor. I can't explain why it happened but I just let the thing run itself. I remember it usually happens this way in the beginning.

[r4211z]

Thanks man, now is silent but there is only a little gap, that i can live with it.
Today i just notice a lot of tiny bubbles when i came home, seems like my surface skimmer is sucking a lot of air into my Ehiem and thus increasing the bubbles..

Jake

[Excalib12e]

anyone know where to get one of those water filter canisters?

[grey_fox]

You can get it from Nature Aquarium.