Ozone or carbon filtration - What is that?

B

bolis03

[I just finished reading an article on the RC forum, which discusses the topic of how regular maintains on lighting equipment is important than what brand or type of lighting we should use. Another argument in this article, states that regardless of the type of light we use over the tank, the clarity of the water in the tank will affect how effective and beneficial the light source will be to the critters. In addition, in order for the water to reach a level of clarity that would allow the light source to be effective one should use Ozone or carbon filtration. Can some one back this up, and how does one go about using Ozone or Carbon filtration.]
 
[Wow! Too much ozone bad for the tank, too much charcoal causes head and tail degenerative disease as well as other problems.

When you think of how much organic and inorganic stuff is floating around in sea water, the lighting argument gets kinda light-weight :laugh long: I don't know of anyone that does ozone. I used to do occasional charcoal but find that water changes seem to work better and eliminate the extra expense of charcoal.

I know that some dry foods seem to have a dye or colorant in them - using TetraMin food seems to make my fresh water tank yellow much faster than others...anyone else have that experience?

Best to have healthy sand bed and live rock to buffer all that other stuff... :laugh long:]



Edited By cpalmist on 1094062319
 
[I'm not a fan of either method, but a few others are. I run carbon (charcoal is for grilling) 3 days each month.]
 
[I use it all. I use an Ozone generator to keep my ORP between 350 and 400. The ozone is pumped into the Skimmer. It breaks up more complex molecules (too heavy to be skimmed) into smaller ones that can be skimmed. It definitely clears up the water. I run carbon after the skimmer to reduce Ozone from entering the tank. The carbon also acts as a sponge taking out metals and non organic chemicals. since I run carbon all the time it probably becomes saturated after a few days and then just breaks up the ozone. I change out the carbon every 20 days along with the water change.. I even run a UV sterilizer to kill any bacteria in the water. I have sand sifting stars and several types of sand sifting snails to keep the sand bed sanitized. I run a fuge full of cheto to strip any nutrients out of the water and have three mangroves to take up phosphates. Finally about one a quater I bun a phosphate sponge to clear the tank..

can you say sterile environment..]
 
[I also run carbon 24/7 and change it out about every two weeks. I put it some flow through filters, one is an old di cartridge that I modified to put carbon and pump water through it. And I recently started to put carbon in a filter meant for phosphate removal and pump water through that. You can just put carbon in a media bag and put it in a high flow area of the sump, but I do not hink it is as effective as when you pump water through it.
I also run an ozone reactor 24/7 and will keep up with it using a orp probe hooked up to a Aquacontroller. I also have to hooked into the skimmer.
I read that article on R.C. about the light penetration by Calfo, I think he was right on in the whole article.]
 
[Currently, I'm using a Magnum 350 canister filter to run carbon or phosphate sponge, but I'm going to build a small device that uses a little powerhead. In an article I read, it recommended very slowly flowing water through the carbon to get the best results.

Since I only run it 3 days a month, it will be something small, easy to store, and use very little power.

Putting a bag of carbon in the sump is called passive filtering, and not very effective. Active filtering is when you pass water through the media, and that is what I want to do. Using the Magnum 350, my water became crystal clear after about 36 hours, and things really sparkled.]
 
@Marc wrote:
[it recommended very slowly flowing water through the carbon to get the best results.] said:
[Same with Phosban.
I am getting a Phosban reactor in the group buy and was going to just throw on an extra MJ 1200 to run it but I noticed it says 80-gph max flow rate. I called and asked why and was told that any faster will "fluidize" the media and prevent it from working as effective.]
Click to expand...
 
[What Ron said :)

I will be running both carbon and Ozone on my new reef....carbon is pretty much manditory if your going to use ozone, well maybe not manditory but HIGHLY recommended.

Both will make the water more optically clear. It may look clear to you now, but put some into a white bucket and you will see the difference...]
 
[Just a word on the Phosban reactor. They are great for just about any granular media. I tried it like they show with just the sponges it comes with and had one stop flowing in 24 hours and one that the sponge tilted and started channeling flow in just one spot. Now I am using filter floss on either side of what ever I put in it and filling it from sponge to sponge. It does come with a valve to lower the flow if you happen to already have a powerhead that is two big.
I know this will not help on the outlet of the skimmer, but it is a good way to run carbon otherwise. I have run ozone on my DAS BX skimmers before and just used a carbon pad on the outlet.]
 
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