Coral Chips and Nitrates, In Sump Tank, NO3 Options

[Kinder]

Answer to your "Low PH" crises!

Click Here - PH Buffer

But note if you go ahead & buffer....please do a 100% water change and then buffer your new water. Coz there could be ammonium present in your tank, which is different than 0ppm ammonia reading.

And this topic is about 4pages...so please read all of it.

cheers
Kinder

This post has been edited by Kinder: Mon, 23 Oct 2006 1:38 pm

[gohks]

Remove all the material from one of your canister and totally fill it up with coral chips, nothing else. Run it for 1 week (without water change) and measure your pH and NO3. You will be getting surprise results. )

[The Matrix]

outdoor sure to have a lot of wall algae one leh ... unless u scrub off lah.

2 cannisters overkill liao. gohks already mentioned 1 of the method and buffering is another. add both together u got a better solution. if u want to invest more money, can use oyster shells.

must be feeding a lot right ? u can try by changing more water weekly. reduce your loading ( 10 fish in small tub ... ) or u can try using nitrate removing resin as discuss in RG recently. Ask the doc for more info .

[goofy1984]

Hi everyone,

Thanks for your advise. Loaded coral chips on 1 tray of both of my cannisters, 5 days already and ph stay at 7.5, ammonia & nitrites 0 and nitrate at less than 50mg/l. Also changed both pumps to eheim cos both boyu pumps were running significantly slow even though i dismantled and cleaned them. Thanks.

[gohks]

Hi everyone,

Thanks for your advise. Loaded coral chips on 1 tray of both of my cannisters, 5 days already and ph stay at 7.5, ammonia & nitrites 0 and nitrate at less than 50mg/l. Also changed both pumps to eheim cos both boyu pumps were running significantly slow even though i dismantled and cleaned them. Thanks.

Glad to hear that. Keep monitoring the NO3, as you should be able to keep it in check with the right coral chips setup. No chemical or algae means which alot of people don't believe

[The Matrix]

Hi everyone,

Thanks for your advise. Loaded coral chips on 1 tray of both of my cannisters, 5 days already and ph stay at 7.5, ammonia & nitrites 0 and nitrate at less than 50mg/l. Also changed both pumps to eheim cos both boyu pumps were running significantly slow even though i dismantled and cleaned them. Thanks.

Continue the monitoring. take yr time to learn more new things.

[desireless]

Glad to hear that. Keep monitoring the NO3, as you should be able to keep it in check with the right coral chips setup. No chemical or algae means which alot of people don't believe

It is not that we don't believe the wonder of coral chips but rather, I do not encourage members to use coral chips to maintain nitrates. The usage of Coral chips as a nitrate/dirt absorber...

.....
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So the bottomline is stilll..... Water change, water change and water change.

This post has been edited by desireless: Wed, 01 Nov 2006 11:08 pm
Reason: I re-read the article and realized that I misunderstood. Thanks gohks for pointing that out

[gohks]

desireless,
Actually is not absorption, but the effect of denitrifying. When the canister filled with corals, water flow is very slow and area passing through is low in oxygen, anaerobic BB grows, these will strip the oxygen off the NO3 in order to survive, leaving only N2 gas. If canister is big with lots of coral, NO3 could even be zero. You could still change water regularly to get rid of other unwanted products, but NO3 problem is behind us. Don't forsee any other side effect if you have enough areation in your tank.
So, instead of using chemical or algae/plant means, this will be a better method if you have a spare canister.

[desireless]

Umm... thanks for bringing that out. but why specifically coral chips and not bio balls which is more commonly used as denitrifying media?

The downside with coral chips is that they tend to trap debris/dirt easily and if not treated, will bring about a nitrate boom. Usually it wil be too late to take actions by then.

[gohks]

I think the shape and size of coral chips can easily create a compact "dead zone" in a long canister which anaerobic BB thrive. Moreover, it gives the 2 in 1 benefits of buffering and BB. This setup needs maintenance like any other filter to take care of the debris/dirt of concerns.

[ranchu8]

I don't know much/experience about all these but there seems to be some problems. If dead zone, how does NO3 in all the different parts of the water get denitified? If the different parts of the water go through this area, how can it be devoid of O2 since denitrifying bacteria are essentially anaerobic? And do these anaerobic bacteria produce toxins? Has anyone measured such a system showing negligible NO3?

This post has been edited by ranchu8: Thu, 02 Nov 2006 1:13 am

[desireless]

Actually I have been waiting someone to burst "this balloon of mystery"

I asked "why specifically coral chips" is because I feel that there is a need to be opened about the role of coral chips in denitrifying mechanism. From what we (Goldrush and me) gather from hobbyists who use coral chips, there seems to be a mutual acceptance that it helps in controling nitrates. Except that from how the information was put to us, we could not understand how this was done.

The unwillingness to open up has caused quite a lot of misunderstanding about coral chips. It made people think that coral chips has some magical chemical effect on nitrates. I am not shy to say that I was one of them. So when Goh mentioned that "water flow is very slow and area passing through is low in oxygen", it suddenly became very clear, how the physical aspects of coral chips "help" in the denitrifying process.


It is NOT the chemical effect from the coral chips themselves that is doing the denitrifying, but rather, the physical textures that can sustain anaerobic bacteria, which in turn converts nitrates into nitrogen gas


This is basically the concept behind TT (Trickle Tower), which is widely adopted by koi hobbyists.

So, if someone is wondering why your friends keep telling you that "coral chips help in controlling nitrates", Goh has already given you an answer here.

[gohks]

Perhaps that could explain why my UGF laid with thk coral chips has constantly unbelievable zero NO3 compared to having an exploding NO3 on bare tank and people has been promoting layers of coral chips in sump tank to take care of NO3 is indeed true. Of course, the trade off would be the mentioned "time-bomb" if this setup is not well maintained.
Now I understand why some people stress and live by coral chips being a MUST and very important in goldfish keeping. )

[The Matrix]

not bad at all. continue to explore on this topic and find more risks and exceptions. not entirely correct to say " coral chips help in conrolling nitrates ", but getting close.

[GoldfisHub]

not bad at all. continue to explore on this topic and find more risks and exceptions. not entirely correct to say " coral chips help in conrolling nitrates ", but getting close.

Hi All, sorry for not keeping with any updates on my setup. A major mistake that I had created in my design causing a bit of problem hence did not work as I wanted it to be. The mechanical filter was not robust enough to take care of all the poo poo, hence quite a fair bit went into the coral chips area. Looking at the situation, within a few months, the coral chips area will be clog and will cause a lot of problem.

Quite busy for this period of time hence will re-do the sump tank when got more time.