How long does CO2 scrubber media last you?

[afboundguy]

I know it's highly dependent on a lot of things but curious how long people are getting out of their CO2 scrubber media? I stupidly made the mistake of not replacing the media in a scrubber I hadn't used in well over a year as it hadn't changed colors. I did a little research and said that it can change back to white and leach CO2 back into the tank which makes sense as my pH rose by 0.3-0.4 when I put in fresh media!

 

[John Neuzil]

I use a recirculating system and a bit over a month.

 

[cjtabares]

I know it's highly dependent on a lot of things but curious how long people are getting out of their CO2 scrubber media? I stupidly made the mistake of not replacing the media in a scrubber I hadn't used in well over a year as it hadn't changed colors. I did a little research and said that it can change back to white and leach CO2 back into the tank which makes sense as my pH rose by 0.3-0.4 when I put in fresh media!

I did the same thing, and just learned it could change back. I ended up changing the media, but I did not see a much affect on the ph. Any idea how long it would take to change back to the original color? I was checking it pretty often.

 

[afboundguy]

I did the same thing, and just learned it could change back. I ended up changing the media, but I did not see a much affect on the ph. Any idea how long it would take to change back to the original color? I was checking it pretty often.

Not sure. I took off my setup and let it sit for over a year and thought that because it looked white I was all set but clearly I wasn't!

 

[hatfielj]

During the summer months I was changing my media every 2-3 weeks. I use outside air and a humidity chamber before the media.
For some reason lately, my tank's pH has been running really good, like 8.4-8.6. So I'm not really paying attention to my media at the moment.

 

[Randy Holmes-Farley Verified Community Expert]

I did a little research and said that it can change back to white and leach CO2 back into the tank which makes sense as my pH rose by 0.3-0.4 when I put in fresh media!

I'm not seeing a reason why the color would change back during continuous use if it is depleted.

The online discussions of anesthesia media changing back between uses (where no CO2 is present) is not the scenario you have. :)

The rise you saw on replacing it may just have been the higher effectiveness of new media compared to old.