DIY reactor for 2000L tank

[Filip Krupa]

Good afternoon Fine Co2 Jockeys,

Ive read zeus' journal on co2 injection, and it gave me some ideas.
I could tie together smaller ready made reactors (I have plenty of space for them). But id prefer to keep it simpler, and save some cabinet space.

Here is my DIY idea.
A typical setup where co2 gets pushed down by the flow of water, but bigger...
Basically a 2m tower made of 110mm pond piping, with 6 inline diffusers between a dedicated pump in the sump and the reactor.

Is that a good ballpark to start with? Should I go bigger? Amend any fundamentals?

Any advice appreciated before I start experimenting!

 

[foxfish]

I don't know what you mean by

6 inline diffusers between a dedicated pump in the sump and the reactor.

Do you want to use a reactor or an anatomiser, why would you want to use both?
If you have a sump then you can just feed the gas into the return pump.

 

[Filip Krupa]

I don't know what you mean by

Do you want to use a reactor or an anatomiser, why would you want to use both?
If you have a sump then you can just feed the gas into the return pump.

The amount of co2 i will be pumping in will be massive. I want to dissolve as close to 100% of the co2 as possible, with no bubbles appearing in the DT.
Im happy with over kill if thats what it sounds like!

 

[foxfish]

OK well I think you might need a motorised reactor.
Something along the lines of a venture protein skimmer with a sealed top!
So the problem with your idea with the 110mm pipe is the gas will almost certainly collect at the top & although it will still dissolve as the pressure build & the gas water contact becomes under pressure. You cant actually see what is going on & it might take hours after the gas is switched off to completely dissolve.

The concept is to keep the bubble of C02 in suspension for as long as it takes to dissolve. From my experience there are a few ways to do that .. No1 is a vortex within a 100mm tube. Very efficient but difficult to DIY. No 2 a tube with a tapered entry so any bubbles rising get caught back into the flow.
There is a link in my signature about my reactor, it is a few years old & you would need to obviously scale up but, the bottle neck principle still applies.
A dedicated, re circulating, venturi pump could power the reactor & another pump would supply the through flow...

 

[Edvet]

I build one, 120 x 8 cm. Ran on a 2000l/hr separate pump. Co2 fed from above, flow going down against gravity.
The trick is to make a venturi just before the reactor and a small shortcut from to top of the reactor to the venturi so all gas that would get trapped at the top will get sucked up by the venturi and brought back into the water to dissolve.