I hijacked another thread ... that was not really about BCB filtration but little sleep and much reading is my only excuse. Here is some of the background on BCB's http://www.mankysanke.co.uk/html/anoxic_filtration.html But reading https://www.petercoppin.com/pdfs/zeolite-technical-summary-4.pdf .... I am leaning the zeolite might be better than LECA or other clay for zone A Time to do my own BCB. Later Ferdie
I found some zeolite - 25kg and a bag of seachem flourite red. this should suffice for a tank or two. pics to follow. Later Ferdie
Yeah, look this is dead simple to make ... about 4l of zeolite + 400ml of flourite red in each basket. cover it up and a quick rinse ... 20l of water (could probably use tank water for a WC if you in CT) so putting two of these into my standing desk tank ... AKA the convicts cube. You can do the math yourself ( I did not go hunting for the best price on these items) 25kg zeolite R300 SFR R390 basket R15 each. Later Ferdie
Would be interesting to see how this affects your ferts... I am not concerned about the bacteria themselves, but rather the ion exchange from the Bentonite (or in this case Zeolite)... This will also vary depending on whether you are using Jhb tap water (hard) or RO water...
this is on the other side of the tank away from all the flow ... Pre- dumping the baskets in. Later Ferdie
@Lmcloete - 100% no clue, in this tank I do not have plants .. just a truck load of convicts and wood. Also do not do WC really. More top-up ... but since I have marble in the tank to up hardness - yeah will be interesting to see what is what. Also going to try this out on Lucky13 ... a planted tanks that I have been neglecting to get some good algae growth .... will be interesting to see what happens in a planted tank over X period. Later Ferdie
That dashboard is very cool! Do you have a thread with more detail on this? The Zeolite should take up Ca (since this will be available in abundance... Relative to the rest K, Mg etc.) and may give off Na in the process... Should be OK in this case, but may not be great for planted... But then again, if you have hard water and it mostly strips Ca it might be fine?
It is .. just not sure about the accuracy but it seem consistent in whatever it is measuring. See http://www.apsa.co.za/xenforo/threads/one-place-to-post-stuff.14166/page-23#post-223744 Adding a basket to Lucky13 .. Had to pull some plants and a rock to make it fit This is also the tank that has the shelf that is full of LECA or something like that ... so a lekker place to grow stuff .. currently 24x7 flow, typical issues one would see in a bog filter on the shelf. Loads of duckweed and well algae TDS 425 @ 24.3C Not doing a test strip on this ... more interested to see a drop in TDS and maybe algae or duckweed growth long term. Later Ferdie
Lucky 13 TDS 428 Convicts TDS 280 ... Not saying much Black jack the last of the zeolite - got 1 kg left Destroyed the left side to get the two baskets in the tank. Keen to see some roots going into the filter. TDS 233 Later Ferdie
Also got a few small bags of zeolite from takealot ala koinet .. handy if you are not in the market for a 25kg bag. nice thing the crush seems a bit larger .. Koinet on the right. Never thought about recharging zeolite - and that with plain old salt. Later Ferdie
Jip, that was my point above... Ion exchange - gives off Na as is sacavanges other ions (including some your plants may need) ... Thus the Na that goes "missing" should end up in your tank... Could be an issue over time given that the idea is to cut back on water changes. Should only be serious if you constantly recharge your zeolite though....
@Lmcloete 100% .. yeah I get the Na leach thing now. Never recharged zeolite ... BTW been reading using bleach to recharge purigen is probably also not the best idea on the block. Later Ferdie
You can recharge the zeolite with potassium instead of sodium. Then you don't need to worry about water changes to get rid of the sodium ions.
True, should work... Difficult to predict exactly what you will be absorbing though... Seems like it would be capable of scavenging a wide range of elements... Would be great if you could consistently add K and reduce hardness (general) without losing expensive ferts... Would be interesting to test and see over time
Hey guys its been a month how have the tanks been affected I am really interested Sent from my HUAWEI GRA-L09 using Tapatalk
