Quick Question About Co2

[kennygater]

hi just a quick question, my tank is 90 litres am i right in saying there should be 30 bubbles per minute? i have the nutrafin kit and just used the stuff that came with it to start of with. my ph is 7-7.5 and my kh is 0, there is only 13 bubbles per minute.
any advise would be great

 

[Luke_e]

I thought the nutrafin kit was for a max of 75litre? Not sure if the extra 15l could effect it?
A lot of people that use the nutrafin kit say the mix that comes with it is useless and they use their own.

 

[ChrisP]

The extra tank capacity will not affect the Co2 output. It may take a while to get brewing properly so give it a chance.

 

[craynerd]

hi just a quick question, my tank is 90 litres am i right in saying there should be 30 bubbles per minute? i have the nutrafin kit and just used the stuff that came with it to start of with. my ph is 7-7.5 and my kh is 0, there is only 13 bubbles per minute.
any advise would be great

Ken glad to see you have CO2 but i think you have the wrong idea....you need 30ppm not 30 bubbles per minute. Thats 30part per million, which is the "concentration" of CO2 in the water. You test this using a pH and KH reading and use a calculator which there is a link to in the CO2 sticky, which, i would advise you to read again.

I think (and i`m sure people will chip in if i`m wrong) that the more volume you have the more CO2 you will need to inject to disolve into the water. So a 90 liter tank will need more bubbles per minute than a 40 liter tank thats why "bubbles per minute" is a poor guide.

Right, for starts the nutrafin packets of mix is crap. Use your own DIY !! There are countless posts on the forum for a mix, but i think most:

Fill as usual to the first fins with sugar
1 teaspoon of Bakeing powder (Bicarb)

Then mix 1/2 teaspoon of allisons yeast in warm water in a cup and add it to the sugar.
Then fill with warm water just below the normal level.

(certainly do a search to confirm that)

You will get many more bubbles and within a few minutes!! It is much more effective.

Finally, 90 liters is a largish tank for yeast base CO2. I think most would say go pressurised for a more stable CO2 concentration. But then you are talking £100 !! I think you will probably need two CO2 units tho if you stick to yeast systems. Rather than spending another £20 on a nutrafin, just DIY a 2 liter coke bottle, get a T tube and connect both canisters to the same diffuser.

Hope thats helped....i`m sure more will contribute.

Chris

 

[alanchown]

hi just a quick question, my tank is 90 litres am i right in saying there should be 30 bubbles per minute? i have the nutrafin kit and just used the stuff that came with it to start of with. my ph is 7-7.5 and my kh is 0, there is only 13 bubbles per minute.
any advise would be great

Ken glad to see you have CO2 but i think you have the wrong idea....you need 30ppm not 30 bubbles per minute. Thats 30part per million, which is the "concentration" of CO2 in the water. You test this using a pH and KH reading and use a calculator which there is a link to in the CO2 sticky, which, i would advise you to read again.

I think (and i`m sure people will chip in if i`m wrong) that the more volume you have the more CO2 you will need to inject to disolve into the water. So a 90 liter tank will need more bubbles per minute than a 40 liter tank thats why "bubbles per minute" is a poor guide.

Right, for starts the nutrafin packets of mix is crap. Use your own DIY !! There are countless posts on the forum for a mix, but i think most:

Fill as usual to the first fins with sugar
1 teaspoon of Bakeing powder (Bicarb)

Then mix 1/2 teaspoon of allisons yeast in warm water in a cup and add it to the sugar.
Then fill with warm water just below the normal level.

(certainly do a search to confirm that)

You will get many more bubbles and within a few minutes!! It is much more effective.

Finally, 90 liters is a largish tank for yeast base CO2. I think most would say go pressurised for a more stable CO2 concentration. But then you are talking £100 !! I think you will probably need two CO2 units tho if you stick to yeast systems. Rather than spending another £20 on a nutrafin, just DIY a 2 liter coke bottle, get a T tube and connect both canisters to the same diffuser.

Hope thats helped....i`m sure more will contribute.

Chris

I'm running 2 Nutrafins on a 100L aquarium and seem to get 20ppm. Very tempted to go pressurised as I keep having to clean the white gunk off of the diffusers-leaving out the bicarb makes no difference.

Alan

 

[TwoTankAmin]

Danger Will Robinson-

Buffering Capacity (KH, Alkalinity)
Buffering capacity refers to water's ability to keep the pH stable as acids or bases are added. pH and buffering capacity are intertwined with one another; although one might think that adding equal volumes of an acid and neutral water would result in a pH halfway in between, this rarely happens in practice. If the water has sufficient buffering capacity, the buffering capacity can absorb and neutralize the added acid without significantly changing the pH. Conceptually, a buffer acts somewhat like a large sponge. As more acid is added, the ``sponge'' absorbs the acid without changing the pH much. The ``sponge's'' capacity is limited however; once the buffering capacity is used up, the pH changes more rapidly as acids are added.
Buffering has both positive and negative consequences. On the plus side, the nitrogen cycle produces nitric acid (nitrate). Without buffering, your tank's pH would drop over time (a bad thing). With sufficient buffering, the pH stays stable (a good thing). On the negative side, hard tap water often almost always has a large buffering capacity. If the pH of the water is too high for your fish, the buffering capacity makes it difficult to lower the pH to a more appropriate value. Naive attempts to change the pH of water usually fail because buffering effects are ignored.

In freshwater aquariums, most of water's buffering capacity is due to carbonates and bicarbonates. Thus, the terms ``carbonate hardness'' (KH), ``alkalinity'' and ``buffering capacity'' are used interchangeably. Although technically not the same things, they are equivalent in practice in the context of fishkeeping. Note: the term ``alkalinity'' should not be confused with the term ``alkaline''. Alkalinity refers to buffering, while alkaline refers to a solution that is a base (i.e., pH > 7).

How much buffering does your tank need? Most aquarium buffering capacity test kits actually measure KH. The larger the KH, the more resistant to pH changes your water will be. A tank's KH should be high enough to prevent large pH swings in your tank over time. If your KH is below roughly 4.5 dH, you should pay special attention to your tank's pH (e.g, test weekly, until you get a feel for how stable the pH is). This is ESPECIALLY important if you neglect to do frequent partial water changes. In particular, the nitrogen cycle creates a tendency for an established tank's pH to decrease over time. The exact amount of pH change depends on the quantity and rate of nitrates produced, as well as the KH. If your pH drops more than roughly two tenths of a point over a month, you should consider increasing the KH or performing partial water changes more frequently. KH doesn't affect fish directly, so there is no need to match fish species to a particular KH.

Note: it is not a good idea to use distilled water in your tank. By definition, distilled water has essentially no KH. That means that adding even a little bit of acid will change the pH significantly (stressing fish). Because of its instability, distilled (or any essentially pure water) is never used directly. Tap water or other salts must first be added to it in order to increase its GH and KH.

From FINS site http/fins.actwin.com/aquariafaq.html

 

[kennygater]

hi i have mixed my own mix of c02 from the advice of craynard and done another mix in a 2 litre bottle, it started to work straight away but my ph hasnt changed so that cant be right can it? the only thing is i didnt use allisons yeast because the shop didnt have any so i used another make, would that matter? any help would be great.

 

[craynerd]

hi i have mixed my own mix of c02 from the advice of craynard

OHHH HELL ...i don`t like that idea of peeps using my advice! lol

As long as it started bubbling then it HAS to be making CO2. I only recommended Allisons yeast since this is what i use and i know a few others do! but any yeast should work fine. Therefore if you are seeing bubbles it must be CO2.

SO....if your seeing bubbles, your definately producing CO2 but if your pH hasn`t changed then it mustn`t be diffusing into the water correctly. YOu will need to wait for more responses since i am unsure now, but i would check that your surface water disturbance (by the filter outflow) is at a minimum and your diffusion method is working correctly!

That is strange!

Whats your pH and KH just purely out of interest?

 

[simonbrown403]

Just wait a little it might tank a little wile in larger tanks, if it changes at all, what size tank do you have and how do you defuse you co2?

Here's a little light reading on diy yeast and sugar co2, it has a good section on different yeast types that you might of used.

http/www.qsl.net/w2wdx/aquaria/diyco2.html
DIY CO2 System for Planted Aquarium

 

[kennygater]

thanks for the quick reply, my ph is 7 7-5 and i cant find my kh test kit at the moment so i cant test that yet. about the filter inlet it is a long tube with little holes in it and i have got it at the top of my tank facing upwords but it moves the top of the water thats the best place i could find for it because it disturbs the plants and sand if i have it anywhere else, do you think that would let the co2 escape from the water to quickly?

Just wait a little it might tank a little wile in larger tanks, if it changes at all, what size tank do you have and how do you defuse you co2?

Here's a little light reading on diy yeast and sugar co2, it has a good section on different yeast types that you might of used.

http/www.qsl.net/w2wdx/aquaria/diyco2.html
DIY CO2 System for Planted Aquarium

my tank is 90 litres and i have got the nutrafin kit and the 2 litre bottle going into the ladder in the tank there is a lot more co2 bubbles. and my plants do seem to be doing realy well.
thanks

 

[craynerd]

i have heard other ions in the water and also nutrients like phosphates can effect the testing!

BUT you are also clueless without the the KH value. since KH and pH are related your pH may not have moved but KH adjusted proportionally with the CO2 rise! Hence in theory your CO2 could rise without your pH rising! Test pH and KH and use the calculator to see what your CO2 concentration is! this will be a more accurate guide!

 

[zig]

With 0 Kh your Ph should move pretty fast as you inject the CO2, this is probably not a great idea as it may stress the fish in the tank, basically you have no buffering capacity to stop large movements in your Ph, so when you inject CO2 you Ph will drop very fast, you might want to add some bicarbonate of soda at water change time to bring the Kh up a little, 4-5Kh is loads, and will stop the Ph dropping to fast.