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DIY Project High flow DIY reactor - now with video

I Installed the cartridge that Alje linked to on eBay today, fits great and I reckon one would find it hard to find a bottle that worked better.

For the price I would defiantly recommend over trying to find the perfect bottle 🙂

Saying that I'm still getting small bubbles escaping as I did with a bottle, I'm porting in co2 into the water housing using just co2 pipe so maybe the bubbles are to big?
Might change to a up inline before the water housing tomorrow and see if I can stop the bubbles escaping as much.

Anyone found that using a ceramic or air stone gets better results over just running in co2 tube?
 
That is a very neat looking alterinitve to the bottle. 🙂

When I was experimenting with the design, I started off with a straight lenth of acrylic but found that a bottle with a tapering neck produced less build up of gas within the chamber but it must be very dependent on the flow rate.

I find it interesting that some people like to use inline atomisers in conjunction with the reactor as I originally though the reactor was a way to avoid probermatic high pressure devices!
It would be great to hear what happens if you do fit an inline device......
 
Yea I agree foxfish, it not ideal as i suppose you designed it be a alternative to ceramics.
But I'm thinking injecting smaller bubbles into it could dissolve co2 quicker and stop bubbles escaping....that or the smaller bubbles will just all join together to form larger ones once in the chamber 🙂 but we shall see.

I'm not getting a build up of gas, as in the water from filter isn't falling into a void in the chamber, just a churn of bubbles like in your video, just seems the housing is to short....wish the 20" housings were cheaper 🙁
 
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Let's just say that didn't work!
Misting a lot more than without inline, micro bubbles just seem to be flowing straight through filter housing and into tank and not churning around like with larger bubbles.

Next step taking out up inline and try a bit of corse filter foam in bottom of housing to try and trap rogue bubbles.
 
Hey Terry,
I have the same problem as you and would like to hear if adding the course filter foam prevented the bubbles from escaping the reactor. And was there any noticeable decrease in flowrate?
 
Hi, no the media didnt really make much difference, I still ether get a build up of gas at the top of the bottle or if I put a shorter bottle in I get bubbles in the tank.
I'm pretty sure in my case the filter just isn't man enough (not enough flow through) to dissolve the gas without having it build up.
I Can't seem to get the rite balance. I.e no build up and no bubbles in the tank.
 
Could gas build up within the bottle be made to become less of a problem if a window was cut in the bottle near the top and a waterproof gas permeable membrane fixed over the space. This way if there is gas build up then the gas can slowly diffuse across the membrane patch and into the water increasing the efficiency of the bottle? I thought something like Tyvek could be used for the membrane or if a greater pore sized was needed for greater diffusion then maybe a material like Goretex could be used instead.

🙂
 
If you can tune the reactor in, then they work very well.
It is the continuous motion of the C02 bubbles that dissolve the gas.
However it does seem they are not always easy to dial in!
All I can suggest is too keep trying out new bottle shapes.
As I have stated before I think the popular 10" vessels cant take much flow, it would seem the much bigger 20" models are much more efficient.
The 12" model that I use, as seen in the video, works faultlessly but you don't see that size for sale anymore.
 
Mr.Manjushri said:
Wouldn't a membrane like that significantly reduce flow though?
Click to expand...

You're not trying to pass water across the membrane, it's to form a separating barrier between the two spaces within the reactor (bottle and reactor vessel), the higher the membrane is placed on the bottle side (via window cut in the bottle) the more likely it will come into contact with gas build up. The thought was that if the membrane was impermeable to liquid water but permeable to gas then the co2 should diffuse through (how fast depends on the pore size of the material, and whether gas builds up within the bottle). I don't see why the bottle itself could not be replaced and made entirely of membrane, as long as the structure was made rigid enough that it did not distort and disrupt flow.

I haven't tried this, it's just a bit of out the box thinking thrown to the wind.

🙂
 
So with the sera's track record I may end up having to make my own too! My sera 1000 is ok for now but it's good to have a back up in case of emergencies... Thanks for linking to the sera thread...
 
@foxfish thinking about not modifying my Fluval FX6 but just adding a new pump to power the external reactor. Is it possible to "merge" the return flows of both filters together?
 
Won't the fx6 have enough power by its self to have a reactor inline? Or is it a large tank?
 
I have built this reactor but inject the co2 into the 16mm inflow pipe via a t-piece. What I notice is that the co2 bubbles collect at the top and merge to create one large bubble. Is there a way to avoid this?
 
A build up of gas is quite usual and is in fact not an issue at all unless the bubble is very large.
First question is ... does the reactor do its job, is it supplying enough dissolved C02 into your tank without micro bubbles?
Second question is ... how long does the collected gas take to disperse once the supply is turned off?
 
Hi Foxfish, thanks for your reply. to answer your first question yes there seems to be enough CO2 dissolved. I have managed to overcome this by turing down the co2 injection rate and now I do not have one large buble my many smaller ones. Currently I am employing a narrow nect bottle but will they a wider neck bottle and see have this affects the bubbles!. I have not checked how long it takes for the gas to dispersed
 
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