To Go, Or Not To Go Co2?

[SwordtailLover]

'Ello! I have a 37 gallon tall tank, (20" wide, 18" deep, 24" tall), and I have three 15W bulbs hanging out on top, giving me about a 1.21 WPG ratio. I have some plants in the tank, but it is not "heavily planted" as some would say. I am trying a CO2 DIY method with the yeast and sugar, but not having much success. After numerous leak fixes and cups upon cups of sugar remixed, I still am not getting a good flow of CO2. I leave it off at night, and hook it back up in the morning, but just having no luck. I am seriously debating on purchasing a full CO2 setup the correct way, but I am wondering how much this is going to cost to run. A tank of this size will need quite a bit of CO2 I'm assuming, so the refill amount will be quite costly.

Any help or suggestions would be greatly appreciated as I am starting to see some hair algae on my java moss and green algae on my substrate. I am currently dosing seachem's flourish as directed on the box, once a week. There are no fish in the tank just yet, as it is in the final stages of cycling. Thanks all for the help : )

 

[angelfishguy]

anyone going to answer??
looking for an answer mysel lol

 

[Geoff1991]

It doesnt have to be expensive, you can make a DIY set out of a fire extingusher. Without reading this thread again i think the total cost is about £70

http/www.fishforums.net/index.php?showtopic=212550

 

[waterdrop]

With that much light, no pressurized (yet) and it being a new tank, I'd consider dropping hours from the photoperiod as an initial measure while you're working out your plan. Some of the planted guys have reported starting new tanks as low as 4 hours of light for the day (this is to both slow the start of algae and also because the plants both don't have carbon yet to make large amounts of sugars and because they will be slow to rev up to a higher growing rate (generalizing here some as I'm obviously not yet a full-fledged planted guy myself by any means, lol)) They report gradually adding hours at some later stages.

Now, back to the planning! I agree with Geoff. It doesn't have to be so expensive and Aaron and others in this group seem to do a good job helping people to keep costs down in various ways. The general observation with pressurized is that its initial cost is of course much higher than the other two methods (DIY and liquid) but after its acquired, it is superior by far to the other methods in its carbon delivery and its stability and I believe the CO2 refills don't amount to all that much of an expense usually.

Swordtail, with the effort you're putting in to DIY, you could switch over to putting that effort in to building a fire extinguisher system and end up with something quite superior. Oh, and from what I've read, its definatly worth the trouble to go bigger on your CO2 tank size (not saying it has to be the biggest, just to choose upward if you have a reasonable choice) as it saves a lot of hassle going for the fill-ups.

~~waterdrop~~

 

[SwordtailLover]

Well, will something like this work? CO2 Regulator It says it has a bubble counter, needle valve, and the regulator. Free shipping is nice. I'm just wondering if it is worth it. The sugar alone will add up, plus all the time spent trying to get the recipes correct...

 

[waterdrop]

I don't know the best advice on that regulator straight out Sword. I do know that in the threads on here when people are building their pressurized systems from various parts, I've heard them worry about some regulators having not as good needle valves (I think) and thus not being able to be as fine-tuned and I think I remember that some of them have bubble counters that turn out to be worthless.

Now I tend to be super-slow and cautious so I might not be the person to listen to by a long shot, but I tend to think of something in this cost range as needing a fair amount of research if I were doing it. You might want to give a try to Amunets thread here in the planted section. A short while back that was a fun one to follow and had some pictures and all.

~~waterdrop~~

 

[aaronnorth]

the reason you have algae is because you have ammonia present in the water column
ammonia + light = algae

there are a couple of guides in my sig. It costs about £80 to setup incluing a 2Kg fire extinguisher, which will last you 3-4months. refills are anything from £5-£15. new bottles are about £25 including postage of the net, or i know a osurce of 5Kg's which are £37 including postage.

That reg is fine, but the connectiong between the bubble counter & needle valve is a bit dodgy, often leaking. But it is easily fixed by using some PTFE tape around the joint which fixes it, or you can buy another bubble counter...

you also need a drop checker to measure the levels... again another guide in my sig.

 

[SwordtailLover]

Thanks for all the help, again. : ) I am going to hold off on spending money on this pressurized CO2 setup until I get this tank fully going. I am going to just postpone the CO2 for a few weeks until the tank is done cycling and check out what happens with the algae and what not. I am probably going to end up spending about 200 dollars on this, but that'll be worth it if it works well. From the prices I've seen on ebay, and checking local stores, I can get a decent Regulator for about 55 dollars after shipping. Haven't found a CO2 fire extinguisher just yet, still looking. Will keep you guys posted on my success. Thanks again all : )