Sulfur Denitrator questions.

[iReefer12]

It’s really interesting, I noticed my ORP slipped into + last couple of weeks, haven’t noticed any change in the parameters of the tank, so I figured it was no big deal. I checked the Effluent yesterday and it was the same as the display NO3… I then turned down the flow rate quite a bit, almost 50%… ORP went down and is now around -50, tested the effluent today and it’s about 1/2 of the display, hoping tomorrow it’s even lower again.

My theory is that when the No3 levels are high, you need a high flow rate to be in a safe but effective range, and as No3 levels drop and lower, you need a slower flow rate to be effective… just an observation and a theory, no idea if it’s accurate?

 

[MikeTheNewbie]

Hi iReefer,

I thought you might be interested in my own sulphur reactor journey. Through excel, I have plotted my ORP readings (ml/min) vs effluent FLOW (mv) from Jul6th to today Aug 8. During this time, my Display tank nitrates have gone from over 75ppm to today 15ppm. Over this period I have adjusted the flow daily, with the goal of keeping my effluent nitrates above 0ppm. This measuring the effluent nitrate and the adjusting the effluent flow was extremely tedious and often I could not adjust the flow correctly and wound up with unwanted zero ppm effluent readings. I believe that 0ppm effluent results in unwanted sulphur gas bubbles collecting at the top of my reactor lid.



I tried my best to find some general relationship of the ORP values to help me with when to adjust the effluent flow and by how much. The ORP values were so sensitive to the flow, sometimes quickly rising way up or sometimes quickly falling way down, that I could not make any general conclusions to when to make flow adjustments and still keeping my effluent nitrates above zero.



Since you have also seemed to be keeping track of the ORP values during your journey, I thought you might be interested in my scattered results. Personally, I have not found any meaningful relationships using ORP to help me dial in the sulphur reactor.

Ron

I love using charts to find trends and correlations. Too bad ORP didn't help dialing in the flow.
How were you measuring flow?
Have you tried comparing ORP against NO3 reading at the effluent?

 

[MikeTheNewbie]

This is the math I accumulated when I was researching to set one up.

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Volume of media to use:
Math: 0.6L of sulfur per 100 gallons.
800g x 0.6=4.8.
So go with 4l to start. (I erred on the side of caution.)

Flow rate:
Math= 3-4lph per L of media.
4L x 4LPH = 16LPH = 260ml/Min
Flow rate: If 4L of media = 260ml/min

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Sorry everything is in liters, but that’s the unit of measure everyone was using, so just went with it.

Did you rinse or prepare your sulfur media before adding it to the reactor?
I noticed some dust on mine, and wonder if rinsing or letting it sit in RODI water for some time would be useful.
Thanks for sharing your experiences!