Add a second DIY Co2?

justintoxicated

justintoxicated

AC Members
Dec 19, 2005
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Hi I already have the Hagen Co2 System, and I love the fact you can hang it on the back of the aquarium.

I have however notice my plants still do much better and i get way less hair algae when I does Flourish Excel.

I thik my 20 gallon needs a little more Co2.

I was thinking this tiem to just buy the ladder, but I kind of like the kit.

Another option I thought about was using a 2 liter bottle and directing the tubing into the Canister filter's intake as this would be compleatly free ;) but I'm not sure how well it would work or if it would damage my Fluval 204.
 
Fluval's tend to burp and may damage the impeller when injecting CO2 into the intake. I suggesting using a diffuser called the Mighty Mini or the Mighty Momato, you can find both of them at aquabotanic.com (scroll to the bottom of the page) I used the mighty momato and it was great. However, I strongly suggest you test for KH and pH and use a calculator or chart (you can find one here just scroll down) to figure out how much CO2 you actually have in the water. Be careful not to over do it as you can easily suffocate your fish as CO2 decreases oxygen levels.
 
Well I am running 2 hagen units in a venturi DIY diffuser. My hagen ladder is being used to hold the airstone line in place for night time CO2 degassing. A photo of the venturi in action is here. Its in the right corner.

P1010197Small.jpg
 
I have a KH and GH test kits, but I don't know what good they will do since I have crushed coral in my filter as well. I don't think I can estimate anything accurately.

The crushed coral keeps my PH high by boosting the KH (I think?) for my mystery snails. I believe we typicaly have hard water here in Long Beah since every time I wash my truck I get water spots unless I keep the thing wet untill I have towels in hand to dry it.

I also have an airstone on a timer that kicks on 15 min after the lights shut off and shuts off 1/2 hour before the lights turn back on.

I guess I could just use a second bubble lader as the bubles are generaly very small byt he time they reach the top, or do I really need to try one of those whatchamajigs to difuse the CO2 better?
 
What is your tank water's kH?
What is your tank water's pH?
You need to know what you've got, CO2ppm-wise to know whether you need more.
Don't guess at CO2. Test the two above parameters and reply with the results.

BTW, it would be a good idea to test your tap water for kH, pH, gH and P. Take a sample of your tap water and let it sit for 2 - 3 hours, then test and post those results as well please. If you have hard water in your area, you may not need the coral.

Len
 
justintoxicated said:
I guess I could just use a second bubble lader as the bubles are generaly very small byt he time they reach the top, or do I really need to try one of those whatchamajigs to difuse the CO2 better?
Click to expand...

When I used the bubble ladders, the bubbles got smaller and smaller but my CO2 was very unstable and I ended up with a black beard algae infestation. If you look at that vase, no pink was visible at all for a few months due to BBA problems. That swordplant in the middle was covered in BBA also. As soon as I switched diffusers from that ladder to the venturi, and upped my fertilization, the BBA started dying. If you look at the swordplant, you won't notice a single spot of BBA. The vase is also turning pink again as my fish eat away the dying BBA :D

I do admit to doing some heavy pruning hence why the plant load looks rather sparse right now. But any scrubbing of that vase would remove the paint so the BBA dieback on there was not due to pruning.
 
djlen said:
What is your tank water's kH?
What is your tank water's pH?
You need to know what you've got, CO2ppm-wise to know whether you need more.
Don't guess at CO2. Test the two above parameters and reply with the results.

BTW, it would be a good idea to test your tap water for kH, pH, gH and P. Take a sample of your tap water and let it sit for 2 - 3 hours, then test and post those results as well please. If you have hard water in your area, you may not need the coral.

Len
Click to expand...

What is the purpose of testing if the KH and Gh are sckewed by having so much crushed coral int eh tank already?

I was getting BBA, but started dosing Excel which cleared it up, but if my plants need excel + the bubble ladder that indicates to me I need more Co2.

I don't really understand how that difuser works? Why would I get more Co2 than using the ladder?
 
justintoxicated said:
What is the purpose of testing if the KH and Gh are sckewed by having so much crushed coral int eh tank already?

I don't really understand how that difuser works? Why would I get more Co2 than using the ladder?
Click to expand...

The crushed coral doesn't "screw up" your water parameters, it just changes them. They're still your water parameters. They only thing that "screws things up" is if you add an acid or a buffer which would make the CO2/ph/kH chart not work (but it would still be worth knowing the numbers for other reasons).

The diffusor makes really tiny bubbles, probably smaller than even your bubbles at the very top of your ladder - smaller bubbles = more CO2 in contact with the water = more CO2 dissolved into the water. A diffusor does need more pressure so it takes a few hours longer after you recharge the container for the bubbles to get going.
 
The diffuser swirls the bubbles around and mixes them with the water dissolving them. It also chops the bubbles into a mist which then gets distributed throughout the tank and brings gas form CO2 directly to the plants. I am currently having too much CO2 problems with my Hagen system on my 29 gallon because it is just so darn efficient at dissolving CO2 with my reactor.
 
I had the ladder. I thought it was pretty cool too, but a reactor is waayy better. I found that out for myself. The plants love it, and I love the co2 mist, which is waayy coooler.


Lissette
 
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