New To Co2 - Help And Advice Needed Please.

[rich05uk]

Hi,

I'm sure this must have been discussed somewhere but I cannot find it after searching for hours on this forum and several days on the internet. But, I am now finally in a position to invest in a good, high quality CO2 system and need some advice.

Lets just say that money is no object, what would be the best (non computer) CO2 system to buy? I've looked at the DIY Pressurised systems and I'm not interested, the Fire Extinguisher system in particular has a lot of uncertainty in safety so I'm happy to spend the extra money on a good quality branded system.

Following my research I believe I have narrowed the choice down to a Dennerle system, an Aqua-Medic System or a combination of the 2, does this sound reasonable? If there is a better make that I haven't mentioned then I am open to consider other makes.

I was thinking of going for one of the Dennerle CO2 Classic-Line Exclusive systems as shown here

www.dennerle.info/EN/HG26UG05.htm (Scroll down to 3[sup]rd[/sup] & 4[sup]th[/sup] items)

I would also like to shut off the CO2 at night, so was impressed with the Aqua-Medic M-ventil Pulse Solenoid valve for CO2, the key here is that it is Pulse Controlled so only uses power to switch CO2 on/off so the unit stays cool during operation and uses hardly any power at all. Item can be seen here

www.aqua-medic.de/freshwater/en/2/M-ventil%20Pulse/

Are these items compatible with each other and does this sound like a good, high quality setup? If not then are there any other Pulse Controlled Solenoid valves on the market that are compatible?

If however it is compatible with Dennerle, then it leaves me with the following 2 questions

Where can I get the bottles filled for a Dennerle system, I believe that all CO2 refillable bottles are all standard fittings in the UK, is this right? If so I assume I can use any standard CO2 refillable bottle, such as JBL bottles which I know I can get from my LFS?

Where can I get the regulator serviced as I hope to use the system for many years to come and should any of the seals fail or it becomes obvious from visual inspection it needs attention, how do I get it serviced?

Thanks for reading this long post and I appreciate any help TFF users can give me, you have all been very helpful to me in the past so fingers crossed you can help me again.

Richard.

 

[Wolfenrook]

I wouldn't bother paying branded money for CO2 equipment. I got my set from Lunapet/Aquariumversand on ebay for £120 including delivery, 500g refillable bottle, glass diffuser, solenoid etc. Or you could source the parts seperately on ebay and use a CO2 fire extinguisher as the CO2 bottle (I do this with my Lunapet kit, and keep the 500g for when the extinguisher is empty).

Ade

PS. All Dennerle bottles use proprietry threads, not industry standard ones, and so can only be filled at dennerle stockists.

 

[rich05uk]

Thanks Wolfenrook.

Luck seems to be on my side but to keep the long story short - I have been given an old Dennerle regulator with a Dennerle 350g CO2 bottle attached. So in my quest to find somewhere to get this filled, I did a search on Yell.com for CO2 and it returned only 1 shop, it's a place that's about a mile away from me so I called in today. The guy there said he sold CO2 Gas Bottles for Pubs, so he had a look at the regulator and said it should fit. He took the regulator off the Dennerle bottle and guess what, it went onto the Pub Bottle without any trouble, it all worked fine. Further to this, he said he might be able to refill the original Dennerle bottle too, so with risk of damaging the bottle I agreed for him to have ago, 2 minutes later he came back having completely filled the Dennerle bottle and re-attached the regulator. Fantastic, plus he charged me only £4.11, result.

I'm very happy to continue to use this old Dennerle regulator, especially as I know I can get the bottle filled whenever I want for less than £5. It would appear then that the Dennerle Regulator does have industry standard threads so I went back to the Dennerle Website to investigate. It appears that all the regulators that are for refillable bottles (CO2 Classic-Line) are industry standard threads but all the regulators for disposable bottles (CO2 Comfort-Line) are NOT industry standard threads.

So, I just need to buy the rest of the kit now and should have my CO2 up and running soon. Fingers crossed this bit will be as easy.

Thanks.

 

[SuperColey1]

It appears that all the regulators that are for refillable bottles (CO2 Classic-Line) are industry standard threads but all the regulators for disposable bottles (CO2 Comfort-Line) are NOT industry standard threads.

The regulators for refillable and disposable cannisters are bot industry standard threads. They are just different.

I personally use disposable for ease of use and because it is getting increasingly hard to get refilled in the UK with all the restrictions that keep on being thrust on compressed gasses plus the selfish bottled gas companies that insist on only refilling their own bottles.

If you use a regulator for a disposable cannister then you can either use disposable cannisters or get an adaptor that lets you use FEs or refillable cannisters. You reillable regs you cannot use disposable safely even with an adpator (from what I have read on mnay forums)!!!

They are though both industry standard threads, just not the beer gas industry. lol

Andy