Measuring Co2 Levels

[-=Joel=-]

I have been led to believe that some online calculators dont give you the right ppm. So are there any ones the definitely work or is there an easy formula to use?

Thank you

 

[Themuleous]

I haven't really considered substrates that much as currently i have no money to change my gravel etc. It was more a question out of curiousity because sometime in the future i will be looking at making a change over to sand, when who knows.

another question, do nutrients that come from substrates show up in water tests?

Try this page - scroll down and input pH and KH

 

[-=Joel=-]

Thank you.

Thats the one I had found but if others are using it then I guess it must work reasonable well

Joel

 

[RYO]

Lazy man check
co2 table

 

[russellbrooke]

www.practicalfishkeeping.co.uk -> click on tools. Probably the best site on the net for any kind of converter.

You have to register, but as it's probably the only uk based fish keeping magazine web site, i think you details are safe!

 

[zig]

You are correct, there seems to be some doubt as to the accuracy of CO2 tables, and as i have said many times recently a better and probably more accurate way to measure CO2 levels is to do the following.........take a sample of tankwater not tapwater and let it sit for 24 hours, take a Ph reading and then aim for 1 full unit of Ph below that reading through CO2 injection for your tank, and this in theory should give you 30ppm.

Another way to do it is to slowly increase the CO2 until you see a negative response by the fish (they start gasping at the surface) so start reducing the CO2 until the fish are no longer stressed, this is probably the level where you want the CO2, you have to do this slowly or you could kill the fish, so do it over several days.

 

[julia298]

Quoted from the link in Themulous' thread

There are some parts of the country that have high levels of phosphates in their water supply. For those cases, determining CO2 levels will be difficult, as the phosphate will throw off the pH-KH-CO2 relationship, which means the CO2 charts and calculator below won't work. Note that the commercially available CO2 test kits will also be invalidated by the phosphates.

so how do people with high phosphates in their tapwater measure their co2?

 

[plantbrain]

See the 1-1.1 pH unit drop due solely to CO2 gas additions.

You take an ambient sample from the tank that's sat out for 24-48 hopurs and measure the pH.
Reduce that pH measurement 1-1.1 pH units down.

There you go.

There are other similar methods as well, but this one works pretty good.
I like looking at the plants myself to see if they are doing good.

Regards,
Tom Barr

 

[-=Joel=-]

Thank you for replying to my post guys ...

Being very dumb here but what do you mean 1 unit down ... if ph is for example 7.2 what would co2 be ?

 

[zig]

Thank you for replying to my post guys ...

Being very dumb here but what do you mean 1 unit down ... if ph is for example 7.2 what would co2 be ?

You would aim for Ph 6.2, the addition of CO2 will always drive Ph down.

 

[lucky_dresden]

I would imagine the last thing you would want to do is stress your fish out so dosing with CO2 until your fish are on the verge of death seems very dangerous to me (and a touch selfish)

 

[-=Joel=-]

Thank you for replying to my post guys ...

Being very dumb here but what do you mean 1 unit down ... if ph is for example 7.2 what would co2 be ?

You would aim for Ph 6.2, the addition of CO2 will always drive Ph down.

Now I get ya

I was thinking from the ph you get the co2 measurement Lol.

Thank you,

Joel