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Updated picture of the sand after a week or two......
Still white
Andre’s Full blown 300Gallon SPS Reeftank up within a week ;-)
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Updated picture of the sand after a week or two......
Still white
najer
Valuable Member
Updated picture of the sand after a week or two......
Still white
Great pic loving that
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No I use only Reborn and Remag.
used other media such as Coral Lazarus but it's a mined mineral and also increased my Bromine levels when the PH in the Carx was on the low range.
I stick to Reborn. Not sure about the ARM media. You may need to watch trace elements then more often via ICP if you use pure media.
Try ARM in the second chamber only first! Also make sure the PH probe is calibrated!!!
In Carx the internal pressure lead to positive pressure on the probe hence the probe need more often calibration.
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Thank you ;-)Great pic loving that
Wish I could get my big cam ready to take some shots ……….
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If you screen through the thread you occasionally see my CARX calculations.
My latest measurement was as per below:
For my own history - Calcium reactor performance
Effluent Rate : 98ml/min
Effluent ALK rate : 19 dkH
Total 98*60*19 = 112,000 ALK/h
Tank ALK stable at 8.9 according to Salifert
I prefer to run higher effluent rates to maintain a PH in the reactor of 6.6-6.7 somewhere. I noticed the lower PH likely does dissolve the magnesium media mixed in faster, and since it is a mined mineral, it also releases other trace elements then in too high concentrations. One example is Bromine release ended up too high.
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Vibe is still not connected, simply no need for it.
The reactor need to be full of mulm. If it feels like "Man that thing is clogged and need a vibe" then it's exactly where it needs to be.
On my old tank I vibed it at one point once a day for 30 seconds.
I use the white XL NP pellets from Reef Interest.
Well, those are not been made anymore so I have to switch to the XL AIO pellets soon ;-(
Hope they do the same good job.
It's been declared those need only to be refilled, however to me it looks they need partial replacement every 6 months or so. Like 1/3 of the used volume.
The good thing is you can measure with some Nitrates in the tank, the delta of No3 before and after the reactor. That tells you how the reactor is performing.
But this thing need to be full of gunk for that.
I had the reactor given to a local store and they dropped Nitrates down to zero after one week in their system when they kept my SPS corals after the tank disaster for a few months ;-)
Wrasse-cal
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Here is a picture of the temporary CARX setup with second chamber and a 3rd degassing chamber which is fed with C02 scrubbed air, bringing the effluent back to PH of 8
Can you explain how you have the third degassing chamber set up? I’m not understanding the set up.
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This 3rd Chamber is one of a kind, never saw something like this before and I came up with that, but know other people do a similar thing where they simply aerate the effluent prior they feed the effluent into the tank.
Glad you're asking. Wasn't sure if my description is sufficient.
So the Calcium reactor effluent exits the reactor with PH of 6.6/6.7 normally. Then the effluent line connects into the second classic chamber filled with reborn. That exits with a PH of 7.1/7.2 and the exit line has the Needle valve installed.
The 3rd degassing chamber is simply a modified media reactor that was been used in the past as a 2nd chamber. I found the PH of the effluent is still too low hence I thought about a degassing chamber. I drilled a few more holes. One hole allows to enter an airline which I used a simple wood stone at the bottom of this chamber for aeration. On the top the regular exit line is now used for air and gas release. Below the top lid (about 1") I drilled a hole and installed another tube that the effluent can naturally overflow out of this chamber/reactor back into the tank.
So almost the entire effluent/water column is continuously aerated with scrubbed air, that's it.
I modified an air pump where I drilled the casing of the air pump in order to be able to connect it to a Phosban scrubber filled with Soda Lime co2 removal media. Also I siliconed and sealed all gaps on the air pump to make it tight so it does only pulls air through the co2 scrubber!
So I run around 100ml/min of effluent through this chamber/reactor and it brings up the PH of the effluent to about 8-8.1 at the moment which is great since the tank PH went up as well by doing that. The soda lime filling probably lasts for many weeks in that arrangement.
I can recommend this to everyone who wants to get his PH a bit higher ;-)
Hope that helps
Happy Reefing guys!
-Andre
Wrasse-cal
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That’s really a cool idea. I’m having a bit of trouble visualizing it though. Could you snap a few photos?
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That’s right ;-)
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Sure, will make a few close ups and post them shortly!
I wanted to do something similar with my RO water, which has low CO2 & is horrible for DI resin. But I haven’t made it yet- it is kind of difficult because it needs to be pressurized for water to be pushed throughout the DI, but also allow the fresh air to enter and exit.
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I wouldn't worry too much as long its only for Top off.
2 ways to approach this issue.
a. A separate reservoir with levels switches in which the aeration takes place and then an additional pump setup that pumps the RO water through the DI resin etc. However, keeping a reservoir free of microbacterial growth on the long run is challenging.
b. Never saw them for the hobby but you can use media reactors suitable for the line pressure and use self venting air relief valves. Those are for example used on above Water supply lines throughout your neighborhood on bridges etc.
But not sure if you can find media reactors suitable for the water pressure if you use the RODI system with a Top off solenoid which basically would keep everything on pressure.
You would need to place the ATO solenoid prior the Degassing reactor and DI chamber so that only the Top off water gets trough the low pressure components. Hope you can follow what I'm trying to explain, lol.
But again, wouldn't bother too much about the RO water.
I read the improvement on the DI resin with higher PH is not that significant in our hobby systems, but advanced industrial water treatment systems do something in the setup to get the PH up prior the DI stages.
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Time for some picture fun........
WD colony grown out from a 3/4" frag within 8 months
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Some Fragging done..................
Geez, few more racks to be done .... love this part!
Hard to say what is what under 6,5k
Some glow check ;-)
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Long term update on the Clarisea SK-5000 unit ;-)
Still would buy one, but definitely need to be removable every time you replace the roll if you do have it mounted in a stand.
Otherwise you run into the risk of sudden rampage or heart attack while maintaining the unit.
Also the big pipe in the bottom of the unit has a strainer type of grid along the pipe, which need routine cleaning.
The unit has a little adjustable release cover, that will allow to relief unfiltered water to the side back into the sump, which allows to adjust the food and particles to remain in the tank water.
Sort of adjusting the filtration efficiency.
Still would buy one, but definitely need to be removable every time you replace the roll if you do have it mounted in a stand.
Otherwise you run into the risk of sudden rampage or heart attack while maintaining the unit.
Also the big pipe in the bottom of the unit has a strainer type of grid along the pipe, which need routine cleaning.
The unit has a little adjustable release cover, that will allow to relief unfiltered water to the side back into the sump, which allows to adjust the food and particles to remain in the tank water.
Sort of adjusting the filtration efficiency.
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