Zeovit, potassium, and venturi skimmers
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This is an interesting thread and I hope it continues. I still am hoping now that next gen sequencing has dropped so much in price someone in academia will run some pre/post carbon dosing tanks and pre/post zeo tanks to look at changing bacterial populations. I still think these population shifts would be much more telling than just looking at the overall increase or change in total numbers. Of course even if the sequencing cost drops you still need someone with lots of bioinformatics skill. Then maybe toss in RNA-seq for transcriptomics. We now are using both in industry quite a bit for some specific environmental samples.
It would be nice to sample from various locations in the tank as well, water column for sure but also extract DNA/RNA from solid surfaces that provide surfaces for bacterial colonization such as carbon, filter floss, or even filter socks.
It would be nice to sample from various locations in the tank as well, water column for sure but also extract DNA/RNA from solid surfaces that provide surfaces for bacterial colonization such as carbon, filter floss, or even filter socks.
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Yes it will be.
I did ordered the MarinePure Ceramic Biomedia 1 1/2” Spheres by BRS (no scare for the hacker)
It will be here after the weekend and will replace the ZEOlite stone for the Spheres.
Of course before I do I'll take some water samples for Triton to be send in, and two weeks in will send another test in.
Will post here my progress.
Been looking into some info but my 40+ years in this hobby is telling me that not much can go wrong other than a PO4 spike but I will have enough bacteria and newly mix saltwater on hand to jump in.
I'll test already ALK on a daily schedule and will add to that my PO4.
The reason I went with the Spheres is that they will have a larger surface area than if I just could leave the ZEOlite stones.
As usual I'll keep dosing my daily ZEO schedule to not make a to big of offset.
Wish me luck........... The Diesel will either burn or bound to the next step in bio-filteration.
Oh forgot to mention that I use the Large VIBE from AVAST MARINE to tumble the stones and soon the Spheres, every 8 hours it will run for 1 minute.
I did ordered the MarinePure Ceramic Biomedia 1 1/2” Spheres by BRS (no scare for the hacker)
It will be here after the weekend and will replace the ZEOlite stone for the Spheres.
Of course before I do I'll take some water samples for Triton to be send in, and two weeks in will send another test in.
Will post here my progress.
Been looking into some info but my 40+ years in this hobby is telling me that not much can go wrong other than a PO4 spike but I will have enough bacteria and newly mix saltwater on hand to jump in.
I'll test already ALK on a daily schedule and will add to that my PO4.
The reason I went with the Spheres is that they will have a larger surface area than if I just could leave the ZEOlite stones.
As usual I'll keep dosing my daily ZEO schedule to not make a to big of offset.
Wish me luck........... The Diesel will either burn or bound to the next step in bio-filteration.
Oh forgot to mention that I use the Large VIBE from AVAST MARINE to tumble the stones and soon the Spheres, every 8 hours it will run for 1 minute.
I wonder how well the MarinePure will hold up to the vibration. I had a block once and it was very easy to crumble, I cut it in half with a butter knife - very easily. Even moving it I would break off small fragements, but it was the large block, maybe the smaller ones are harder. It should be interesting if triton shows elevated aluminum with the mechanical action on the MarinePure.
Randy Holmes-Farley
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I think folks have seen elevated aluminum just in normal use.
Yes sir, I am curious how much more, if any, all the vibration causes. I would be concerned about it if they are brittle as the one I have.
UK_Pete
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Hmm yea if the media is that soft that you can cut it with a knife, that could be a bit worrying. I remember Randy did some experiments where he found that aluminium significantly affected corals and if you have a mature tank with lots of nice stock, I am not sure thats something worth risking. I agree that as far as the experiment goes, assuming the media really is inert, little can go wrong as its just like leaving the stones replacement for a bit longer. But if the media is in question and if some people have found problems with it, that could be a different matter - not really related to the experiment but more to do with this potentially toxic media.
I appreciate you might be keen to go straight for different media but thought I would mention a couple of things to try first in case you want to try.
First it would be really good for those of us following to know a few bits of info.
What is your phosphate level and if its measurable and you monitor it, do you see it varying depending on how long the stones have been in?
Same with nitrate level (and any other nitrogen tests you do like ammonia) - do you check it and or see it varying?
Also, this claim that corals 'brighten up' or 'color up' when you replace the stones - have you ever seen that and does it always happen?
I was thinking it might be safer to start an experiment very gradually, perhaps either with GFO, or perhaps dosed iron. But also, its possible that the stones are leaching something which is feeding the bacteria which grow on them, in which case old stones might not be affecting phosphates as much as total nitrogen. IE if the stones are keeping the ammonia -> biomass bacteria healthy with trace elements, perhaps when stones get old, its actually total nitrogen which rises rather than phosphates. Or both perhaps.
Either way its going to be very interesting but I just wanted to urge caution if you have a great healthy tank and are considering putting a media in it which has been linked to coral problems. An alternative material might be something like hard limestone chips, although of course as you mentioned the surface area might not be as high as the ceramic media. But I am not convinced that the high surface area of the zeolite is essential myself. If the zeolite is covered with thick biofilm, the question is how much of its deep surface is actually active. Perhaps not much, in which case surface area of the pores would not be important.
I think this ammonia -> biomass process is very different to the denitrifying we are used to dealing with in salt aquaria, with the denitrifying process relying on porosity to create anerobic conditions, by limiting the flow of water (containing oxygen) into the denitrifying zones in media. In contrast for the ammonia -> biomass process, as much oxygen as possible is required, as the process uses large quantities of oxygen. So deep pores would seem to have much less use here. The active layer, where ammonia is converted into biomass, would be limited in thickness to whatever allowed sufficient diffusion of oxygen and nutrients. While a fairly large surface area would be beneficial, there has to be a balance between surface area and oxygen diffusion, and because of that the active layer might even just be the surface layer on the stones, with nothing useful happening within the stones pores.
I appreciate you might be keen to go straight for different media but thought I would mention a couple of things to try first in case you want to try.
First it would be really good for those of us following to know a few bits of info.
What is your phosphate level and if its measurable and you monitor it, do you see it varying depending on how long the stones have been in?
Same with nitrate level (and any other nitrogen tests you do like ammonia) - do you check it and or see it varying?
Also, this claim that corals 'brighten up' or 'color up' when you replace the stones - have you ever seen that and does it always happen?
I was thinking it might be safer to start an experiment very gradually, perhaps either with GFO, or perhaps dosed iron. But also, its possible that the stones are leaching something which is feeding the bacteria which grow on them, in which case old stones might not be affecting phosphates as much as total nitrogen. IE if the stones are keeping the ammonia -> biomass bacteria healthy with trace elements, perhaps when stones get old, its actually total nitrogen which rises rather than phosphates. Or both perhaps.
Either way its going to be very interesting but I just wanted to urge caution if you have a great healthy tank and are considering putting a media in it which has been linked to coral problems. An alternative material might be something like hard limestone chips, although of course as you mentioned the surface area might not be as high as the ceramic media. But I am not convinced that the high surface area of the zeolite is essential myself. If the zeolite is covered with thick biofilm, the question is how much of its deep surface is actually active. Perhaps not much, in which case surface area of the pores would not be important.
I think this ammonia -> biomass process is very different to the denitrifying we are used to dealing with in salt aquaria, with the denitrifying process relying on porosity to create anerobic conditions, by limiting the flow of water (containing oxygen) into the denitrifying zones in media. In contrast for the ammonia -> biomass process, as much oxygen as possible is required, as the process uses large quantities of oxygen. So deep pores would seem to have much less use here. The active layer, where ammonia is converted into biomass, would be limited in thickness to whatever allowed sufficient diffusion of oxygen and nutrients. While a fairly large surface area would be beneficial, there has to be a balance between surface area and oxygen diffusion, and because of that the active layer might even just be the surface layer on the stones, with nothing useful happening within the stones pores.
robf
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I ceramics break down too easily you could just continue to use the old zeo stones. I'm sure the surface area is adequate.
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All good points here to consider.
First off, I do had the two blocks in my sump but had them cycle first for four weeks in a trashcan with moving water and old/used ZEO stones for the bacteria spike.
Never tested the water other than for PO4 and once I sunk the two blocks in my sump Triton didn't found any abnormal elevated Aluminum levels.
I know they leach as I have seen the threads of tank crashes because of it, high level of Aluminum.
I think I'm more worried about the stones crumbling in the Vibe reactor.
That said maybe I should cycle them first like a dozen of them as I did before and introduce them on top of the already ZEO stones in the reactor and monitor them.
The surface area is also a important factor, we used to use lava stone as a surface increaser to the bio filtration years back, they still use it in the fresh water hobby, not so much or not at all in the salt water hobby to my knowledge, I wonder why?
Maybe case the high iron?
So leaving the ZEO stones and adding more to the reactor might be a better solution and over time just dosing the iron in there to compensate for the lack of it the stones leaching in the water column in order to clump the PO4 might be a better solution.
HAHA now my next question is what to do with 2 gallon of Bio Sphere as they are in route.................... maybe I can use them to keep up my skills on the Range and use them as 500 yard targets,
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UK_Pete
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Nice! I shoot full bore too but not semiautos, we are not allowed them over here :-( So its target shooting up to 1200 yards, but only with bolt actions, living near the NSC in Bisley 
Anyway re the aluminium based rocks and tank crashing, it seems worrying and until there is more evidence it might be worth being cautious with those media. I know I decided not to risk it simply because there is lots of other non aluminium available media and that one might be more suitable for fish only tanks for instance. It is a bit strange because I always thought of aluminium oxide as extremely inert, but maybe its not that inert in saltwater, or maybe there are traces of other forms of aluminium than the oxide, which are more reactive or soluble.
Re the lava rock, its possible there is more than just iron that might leach from it and I would be wary of using that in a reef tank (although I know youre not suggesting it). The salt environment is more aggressive and might increase leaching compared to a freshwater tank, and of course our corals are more sensitive than most FW fish.
I think its worth remembering that when we carbon dose, we are probably converting our tanks to a very different form of biological filtration, that had very few similarities to any 'old school' methods. In a way its more similar to algae growing, in that the nutrients are used as nutrients for growing biomass rather than converted to nitrogen gas as in denitrifying. The denitrifying process is a very slow process in comparison and requires very specific conditions which are unusual in a tank unless there is media which specifically creates these conditions, IE the reduced flow, anerobic conditions. Thats what the old school materials like rock with a certain porosity create, and sand beds also create this.
In contrast our heterotrophic ammonia bacteria are more like algae in that they only use the ammonia as a nutrient rather than as a source of energy. The process is much less sensitive to conditions, not requiring anerobic conditions, and being optimal in highly oxygenated water. It even seems that a substrate is not required, although one study I read found that with a substrate to support bacterial films, the process was more efficient. So for this process the old school porous rocks seem unlikely to be helpful, but surface area seems beneficial. Since within fine pores in porous media there is not going to be much oxygen, they probably do not count as surface area for this process. So when we discuss surface area for these heterotrophs, we probably need to think along the lines of macro surface area rather than micro. Like the outside surface of stones rather than the pores of it. Thats why I believe its possible that even stones without pores might be just as good, although I am not certain, its just my current theory.
I do think that either dosing iron, or perhaps using a small amount of GFO if you wanted to be even more cautious, would be the first thing to try. I recently started to dose iron citrate but don't have much SPS to lose. But I took it from Glenns experience that careful dosing of iron does not harm any of his SPS, so I believe thats a reasonably good indicator that its unlikely to be harmful. I would start low though, like a tenth of the amount he doses or less, perhaps 10 ppb a day (I think Randy used to dose about 6 ppb 2 to 3 times a week for his macros as another yardstick). Glenn doses about 0.25 ppm when he needs it to control phosphate, whether that means he will do that daily until his phosphate is in the range he desires I dont know though.
BTW what is your usual phosphate level Diesel? And do you have any photo up already in any threads (I think I read you had a TOTM sometime)?
Anyway re the aluminium based rocks and tank crashing, it seems worrying and until there is more evidence it might be worth being cautious with those media. I know I decided not to risk it simply because there is lots of other non aluminium available media and that one might be more suitable for fish only tanks for instance. It is a bit strange because I always thought of aluminium oxide as extremely inert, but maybe its not that inert in saltwater, or maybe there are traces of other forms of aluminium than the oxide, which are more reactive or soluble.
Re the lava rock, its possible there is more than just iron that might leach from it and I would be wary of using that in a reef tank (although I know youre not suggesting it). The salt environment is more aggressive and might increase leaching compared to a freshwater tank, and of course our corals are more sensitive than most FW fish.
I think its worth remembering that when we carbon dose, we are probably converting our tanks to a very different form of biological filtration, that had very few similarities to any 'old school' methods. In a way its more similar to algae growing, in that the nutrients are used as nutrients for growing biomass rather than converted to nitrogen gas as in denitrifying. The denitrifying process is a very slow process in comparison and requires very specific conditions which are unusual in a tank unless there is media which specifically creates these conditions, IE the reduced flow, anerobic conditions. Thats what the old school materials like rock with a certain porosity create, and sand beds also create this.
In contrast our heterotrophic ammonia bacteria are more like algae in that they only use the ammonia as a nutrient rather than as a source of energy. The process is much less sensitive to conditions, not requiring anerobic conditions, and being optimal in highly oxygenated water. It even seems that a substrate is not required, although one study I read found that with a substrate to support bacterial films, the process was more efficient. So for this process the old school porous rocks seem unlikely to be helpful, but surface area seems beneficial. Since within fine pores in porous media there is not going to be much oxygen, they probably do not count as surface area for this process. So when we discuss surface area for these heterotrophs, we probably need to think along the lines of macro surface area rather than micro. Like the outside surface of stones rather than the pores of it. Thats why I believe its possible that even stones without pores might be just as good, although I am not certain, its just my current theory.
I do think that either dosing iron, or perhaps using a small amount of GFO if you wanted to be even more cautious, would be the first thing to try. I recently started to dose iron citrate but don't have much SPS to lose. But I took it from Glenns experience that careful dosing of iron does not harm any of his SPS, so I believe thats a reasonably good indicator that its unlikely to be harmful. I would start low though, like a tenth of the amount he doses or less, perhaps 10 ppb a day (I think Randy used to dose about 6 ppb 2 to 3 times a week for his macros as another yardstick). Glenn doses about 0.25 ppm when he needs it to control phosphate, whether that means he will do that daily until his phosphate is in the range he desires I dont know though.
BTW what is your usual phosphate level Diesel? And do you have any photo up already in any threads (I think I read you had a TOTM sometime)?
Could run triton test on regular freshly mixed salt, then with something like a 10g aquarium or qt tank hook up new zeostones and the reactor for a few days or a week and send in another test? Nothing in the tank so no feeding, no other additions so any change in elements would be from the stones. So you have fresh mixed baseline reading and then with whatever the zeostones could be releasing (if anything) a week later. It wouldn't be perfect, but could give a baseline if there was anything in zeostone that were released into saltwater. It wouldn't show if carbon dosing on bacteria was doing anything, since there wouldn't be dosing, but after the samples from the tank with the stones running perhaps you could experiment more other additions. Or could do the same thing with tank water that has elevated elements according to triton and run the zeostones and see if they reduce anything.
UK_Pete
Active Member
@Hart that kind of test would be really interesting to do now we have triton testing. Habib, the CEO of salifert, did a few tests a few years ago, and his tests demonstrated significant leaching of iron. Randy has cautioned that Habibs type of test might not be 100% valid due to things like Habib using a chemical reducing agent (ascorbic acid aka vit C) to free the iron, whereas in a tank the mechanism of releasing iron might be different (for instance, biological chelating). Habib did not release his exact figures because he was aware that his methods might not have been appropriate for real world zeo stone use in tanks, but he did suggest that daily additions of 20 ppb iron (a quite large amount) from the zeolite would seem possible according to his tests. So recreating that test in a more accurate and real world way would seem the way to go.
Thing is we can't expect one person to pay for all these triton tests, so sometime I would like to get a few people who are interested together and we could group fund some tests. If we had 10 people that would be like 5 dollars each per test, and we could gradually work through a few tests.
One initial idea for the zeo stone leaching test would be to take tank water which is already 'live' and with some organics in it, and add zeo stones in the right ratio (IE about 1 litre of stones per 400 litres tank volume). Just using a small tank of course so not many stones. I think adding some DOC daily might be worth doing because it seems quite possible that whatever is leached from the stones is leached biologically by the action of bacteria. Leave the stones in for 6 weeks and test water at start and end. The only problem with this is that some elements, like iron for instance, would precipitate out and the triton test at the end would not show the full amount of iron leached, and might even show very low levels despite significant leaching having occurred.
Im not sure how to get around the precipitation problem, without doing a different type of analysis which has already been done. That was Lars analysis some years ago of zeolite before and after putting it in a tank. I asked Randy recently about this one and he feels that the result was an error, since it showed loss of huge amounts of iron from the zeolite, equivalent to about 200 ppb iron per day dosed to the tank. Possibly for instance the sample of stones chosen for the first test (the one before putting stones in the water) contained more iron than the sample that was put in the water, simply because different chunks of zeolite might have different amounts of iron in them. So if an iron rich stone was included in the initial sample it could skew the whole result. Since the test of the zeolite is destructive, you cant put the stones that have been tested into a tank, you have to destroy them to test them. Heres the link FYI
https://translate.google.co.uk/tran...www.larssebralla.de/ma_zeovit.html&edit-text=
But I feel we have more data available since that date regarding SPS tanks, like Glenns is a good example, and others which are using carbon dosing to achieve great results. I think the edge with SPS color that zeovit had years ago is less now, if still present at all, and that the zeo supplements like copper, and the 'mulm' feeding, might explain much if not all of the differences in results between basic carbon dosing and zeo. Glenn uses iron dosing which is interesting at least because of the potential link to zeovit. The 'color up' phenomena that new zeo stones are said to produce is, however, interesting and I would like to get to the bottom of it. Is is linked to phosphate reduction via leached iron, or is it feeding bacteria iron and other trace elements to reinvigorate their ability to keep ammonia low / both ammonia and P low?
One thing that makes comparisons difficult is that I find that many zeovit users seem to like to enhance the saturation of the photos (IE photoshop them) which is a shame.
Thing is we can't expect one person to pay for all these triton tests, so sometime I would like to get a few people who are interested together and we could group fund some tests. If we had 10 people that would be like 5 dollars each per test, and we could gradually work through a few tests.
One initial idea for the zeo stone leaching test would be to take tank water which is already 'live' and with some organics in it, and add zeo stones in the right ratio (IE about 1 litre of stones per 400 litres tank volume). Just using a small tank of course so not many stones. I think adding some DOC daily might be worth doing because it seems quite possible that whatever is leached from the stones is leached biologically by the action of bacteria. Leave the stones in for 6 weeks and test water at start and end. The only problem with this is that some elements, like iron for instance, would precipitate out and the triton test at the end would not show the full amount of iron leached, and might even show very low levels despite significant leaching having occurred.
Im not sure how to get around the precipitation problem, without doing a different type of analysis which has already been done. That was Lars analysis some years ago of zeolite before and after putting it in a tank. I asked Randy recently about this one and he feels that the result was an error, since it showed loss of huge amounts of iron from the zeolite, equivalent to about 200 ppb iron per day dosed to the tank. Possibly for instance the sample of stones chosen for the first test (the one before putting stones in the water) contained more iron than the sample that was put in the water, simply because different chunks of zeolite might have different amounts of iron in them. So if an iron rich stone was included in the initial sample it could skew the whole result. Since the test of the zeolite is destructive, you cant put the stones that have been tested into a tank, you have to destroy them to test them. Heres the link FYI
https://translate.google.co.uk/tran...www.larssebralla.de/ma_zeovit.html&edit-text=
But I feel we have more data available since that date regarding SPS tanks, like Glenns is a good example, and others which are using carbon dosing to achieve great results. I think the edge with SPS color that zeovit had years ago is less now, if still present at all, and that the zeo supplements like copper, and the 'mulm' feeding, might explain much if not all of the differences in results between basic carbon dosing and zeo. Glenn uses iron dosing which is interesting at least because of the potential link to zeovit. The 'color up' phenomena that new zeo stones are said to produce is, however, interesting and I would like to get to the bottom of it. Is is linked to phosphate reduction via leached iron, or is it feeding bacteria iron and other trace elements to reinvigorate their ability to keep ammonia low / both ammonia and P low?
One thing that makes comparisons difficult is that I find that many zeovit users seem to like to enhance the saturation of the photos (IE photoshop them) which is a shame.
UK_Pete, my PO4 is around 0.05 only test bi weekly.
No TOTM but was nominated on a few sites.
No TOTM but was nominated on a few sites.
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UK_Pete
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Diesel, fantastic looking tank. Very nice indeed
Regarding the phosphate, how stable is that? If you test twice a week, does it always come in at 0.05 or does it vary and if so whats the usual top and bottom of the range?
Also do you see any difference when you change the zeo stones? I think that is really important because if you do, then you have a sign to look for when you try dosing whatever you decide to try. IE if you get the color up effect when you dose iron, you know you have found something significant that replicates the effect of new stones.
Re the zeo stones triton test, as I say I think that it would be more tricky than just leaving stones in water for a bit and testing the water. Reason is any iron leached would precipitate and not be measured by the triton test. Perhaps the stones could be removed after 6 weeks, and something like an acid or a chelating agent could be added to the water for a few days, to dissolve the iron precipitate back into the water so it would show up on the test, but I don't know what would be required to dissolve the ferric hydroxide that I think would be the form that the precipitated iron would take, that would be a question for Randy.
Even then, perhaps a full biological system would be required to actually leach the iron from the stones anyway, so maybe a sterile bucket of salt water would not be the best way to test this. Its quite hard to think of a way that would work for sure.
One idea, not perfect but maybe of some use, would be to pulverise a sample of zeolite, and make sure its very well mixed, then split it in two, and soak one half of it it in seawater for a chosen time, then analyse each half of the sample for iron lost. A bit like Lars test I mentioned, but by pulverising the sample and splitting it in two, the chance that the two halves of the sample are different is reduced to negligible levels. The only problem with this is that pulverised zeolite is likely to leach more easily than a solid rock would.
I wonder if Randy is still reading this thread and might have any ideas.
Regarding the phosphate, how stable is that? If you test twice a week, does it always come in at 0.05 or does it vary and if so whats the usual top and bottom of the range?
Also do you see any difference when you change the zeo stones? I think that is really important because if you do, then you have a sign to look for when you try dosing whatever you decide to try. IE if you get the color up effect when you dose iron, you know you have found something significant that replicates the effect of new stones.
Re the zeo stones triton test, as I say I think that it would be more tricky than just leaving stones in water for a bit and testing the water. Reason is any iron leached would precipitate and not be measured by the triton test. Perhaps the stones could be removed after 6 weeks, and something like an acid or a chelating agent could be added to the water for a few days, to dissolve the iron precipitate back into the water so it would show up on the test, but I don't know what would be required to dissolve the ferric hydroxide that I think would be the form that the precipitated iron would take, that would be a question for Randy.
Even then, perhaps a full biological system would be required to actually leach the iron from the stones anyway, so maybe a sterile bucket of salt water would not be the best way to test this. Its quite hard to think of a way that would work for sure.
One idea, not perfect but maybe of some use, would be to pulverise a sample of zeolite, and make sure its very well mixed, then split it in two, and soak one half of it it in seawater for a chosen time, then analyse each half of the sample for iron lost. A bit like Lars test I mentioned, but by pulverising the sample and splitting it in two, the chance that the two halves of the sample are different is reduced to negligible levels. The only problem with this is that pulverised zeolite is likely to leach more easily than a solid rock would.
I wonder if Randy is still reading this thread and might have any ideas.
Thanks for the compliments on the tank guys, it's just not more than a 10 min dedication as of now on a daily base.
Most times I just hang on the couch and enjoy it the fullest.
You right Pete, waiting for Randy Homes-Farley to chime in once again.
Just wondering if the instructions from ZEO has something to do with getting the spike out of the stones before hobbyist apply it o the reactor.
According to them your stones need to be soaked in water for at least a day I always use saltwater to do so.
Most ppl think this is to get the dust off and of course dusty it is but now I'm thinking that on the surface most of the metals for a large part get removed too, what do you guys think?
My PO4 is not going crazy but on a few busy work days as I can't be at the house and feed only at the evening my PO4 can drop close to 0.02 and when I'm working from the house and feed more my PO4 isn't exceed the 0.08 on the most.
These # are based on test results only for me to know what it does if I'm feeding less or more but the # never stays like that for a long time it balance all back to 0.05.
That # it's pretty steady, I know but I'm a someone who like to stick with the schedule as close as possible to have a overall across the board balanced system.
Most times I just hang on the couch and enjoy it the fullest.
You right Pete, waiting for Randy Homes-Farley to chime in once again.
Just wondering if the instructions from ZEO has something to do with getting the spike out of the stones before hobbyist apply it o the reactor.
According to them your stones need to be soaked in water for at least a day I always use saltwater to do so.
Most ppl think this is to get the dust off and of course dusty it is but now I'm thinking that on the surface most of the metals for a large part get removed too, what do you guys think?
My PO4 is not going crazy but on a few busy work days as I can't be at the house and feed only at the evening my PO4 can drop close to 0.02 and when I'm working from the house and feed more my PO4 isn't exceed the 0.08 on the most.
These # are based on test results only for me to know what it does if I'm feeding less or more but the # never stays like that for a long time it balance all back to 0.05.
That # it's pretty steady, I know but I'm a someone who like to stick with the schedule as close as possible to have a overall across the board balanced system.
Randy Holmes-Farley
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Vibration may make chunks break off, but I'm not sure it will impact actual dissolution of the aluminum oxide that much. Both might be a problem, however.
robf
Active Member
I love the picture with all those casings on the ground. Looks like a scene from Scarface LOL
UK_Pete
Active Member
Hi Randy, I was wondering if you had any ideas as to how someone could test for iron being leached from zeolites under real tank conditions, considering its insolubility. We were discussing doing a triton test on some water in which zeolites had been soaked, but I imagine any iron that did leach would precipitate and not be measured in a water sample. If we added a strong chelator to the water then I guess it would leach excessive iron, and not be a good real world test. Would you have any other ideas?
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