Need to increase CO2 - advice

[drjack]

I have a heavily planted tank with a D-D CO2 system which operates at the specified 1 bar pressure maximum. To my cost I have found out that an atomiser I bought won't work unless the pressure is a lot higher (I tried it) so now I place the diffuser directly under my Eheim inflow pipe. A problem (?) I think I have is that the maximum bubble rate I can get is ~ 120/140 bpm, yet I still have some fuzz and beard algae some rust/red on the moss and some green on a few leaves. I also dose 5ml of Flourish Excel 5 days/week. I have now set the CO2 to come on at 8am and off at 8pm. Is this a valid way to increase CO2 if I can't up the bubble rate? Also is my Excel dosing reasonable?. My tank details are as follows:

Tank: Juwel Vision 180 with 125 litres/32 US gallons water.
Lighting: Medium - 2x35W iQuaticsT5 tubes 8 hours/day = 0.6 watts/litre or 2.2 watts/US gal
Substrate: Caribsea Eco-Complete
Filtration: Juwel supplied Bioflow 3 internal plus Eheim Ecco pro 200 external
CO2: D-D Pressurised CO2 plus 5ml Flourish Excel daily
Ferts: E.I. Dosing
Fish: 1xCory , 2xOtocinclus , 2xChain loaches , 6xRasboras , 10xCardinals , 3xWidows , 3xShrimp

Plants ~ 125
45 Crytocoryene Lucens, 1xEchinodorus Schleuteri Leopard, 1xEchinodorus Red Special, 2xEchinodorus Aquartica, 36xLudwigia Repens Rubin, 3xHygrophila Pinnatifida, 2xAponogeton Crispus Red, 14xEleocharis Parvula, 2xAnubias Congensis, 4xVallisneria Spiralis, 12xLimnobium Laevigatum

Any advice really appreciated.
Best Regards, David

 

[m_attt]

sounds more like the flow around the tank is not good enough, i have the same tank with a ecco 300, and a pro3e (1750lph) and still need a koralia to make up for flow when extending spraybars. As was getting beard algae.

 

[drjack]

Hi, thaks for the feedback. I bought a Tunze nano pump, thought this might be the problem. My 2 filters only generate 600lph each. Right now I have it positioned between the 2 spraybars, third attempt to get the best position. I am hoping this will work. My CO2 comes out f the Eheim spraybar only so I hope the Tunze will help to distribute it better.

 

[niru]

You could also try tampering with the needle valve of the regulator to increase the rate to more than 140 bpm..

 

[drjack]

Not sure how to do that. Would increasing the length of time the CO2 runs not achieve the same result? I used to run it from noon to 8pm at 120 bpm but now I run the CO2 from 8am to 8pm so effectively increasing the amount of CO2 injected by 50%. I am assuming this would be the equivalent of running the CO2 from noon to 8pm at 180 bpm? Since I don't know how to "adjust" the needle valve do you think this is a suitable alternative approach?

Sorry new to this... regards, David