Seachem Denitrate in Phosban Reactor

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bavass

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I have a thread on my nitrate problem but I thought I would start a new thread on reducing my nitrates with the use of Seachem De-Nitrate in a Phosban Reactor. As of tonight I have about 500ml of denitrate in the phosban reactor which is about 3/4 the way full. I spoke to a rep at Seachem and that was what they suggested for a 55g tank. I have also added 3 cap fulls of Seachem Stability to help kick start the bacteria in the reactor. Attached to the reactor I have a Rio 90 which is dialed down with there provided ball valve to 2.5gph. I will keep this updated as the weeks go on. I will be out of town till Sunday but will provide a test then. Below is a pic of the Nitrates in the tank as of right now. Higher than I want and this is after a 30% waterchange. I would say they are between 5 and 10ppm. They do look a little darker in the photo than what they actually are. See what you think? Feel free to tag along, make suggestions, what ever.

851899901_BGXno-M.jpg
 
well like a dumb ^%& I didnt take pics of the readings but, the tank is at 5ppm and the water coming out of the Phosban Reactor is at 1ppm. I did do a 15g water change at about 6pm and just ran these tests at 9pm. I added 3 caps of SeaChem Stability after PWC. I will keep the journey going and will retest everything on Thursday when I do my next PWC!
 
so I have changed 30g of water since I put the reactor in. I started trying Reef Crystals, cleaned a small portion of my sand bed. I actually took shots tonight of the readings. Please let me know what you think. I have been talking to a rep at Seachem about the problem and started it beacuse of the de-nitrate at seeting the flow of water. Here is a link to the discusion they have been great. Seachem

coming out of reactor
858096659_ppph7-M.jpg


The Nitrates in the tank

858096664_3D4M8-M.jpg
 
so I have changed 30g of water since I put the reactor in. I started trying Reef Crystals, cleaned a small portion of my sand bed. ...

I think that's great that you're taking a big chunk out of your nitrates. What you're doing though is what I see a lot of people do when they're trying to troubleshoot - they change a whole bunch of things all at once. If you really want to narrow down where a problem is coming from, you have to make one change at a time and be patient to see the results. Your reduction in nitrates could be from the water changes, the salt change, the sand bed cleaning, the Seachem product... or a little of all of them. However it happened, it's a good thing, but it doesn't necessarily mean that the denitrate media was responsible for it.

From my understanding, the denitrate product acts as a quasi-deep sand bed in that it houses the anaerobic bacteria that convert nitrates to nitrogen gas. However, it takes a while for those bacteria to build up and kick in to gear. It would surprise me if it was responsible for the dramatic decrease in nitrates you showed over the first couple days.

[Edit: I just read your thread over on the Seachem forum. Didn't realize you were sucking out major portions of your sand bed. I thought you meant you were just vacuuming the surface. I don't think that's too good of an idea, but to each his own. Keep an eye on your ammonia levels, just to be safe. With the deep disturbance of the sand bed, I wouldn't be surprised if your nitrates start increasing in a week or two.]
 
changing the salt was not actually part of reducing nitrates. I am trying to find the right salt for my tank. I was using Seachem Reef Salt and ran out. Petsolutions was having a sale on 200g of Reef Crystals so I decided to try that. Next I might try Red Sea Coral Pro. You are correct its not saying that it is. The purpose of this thread was to see if it will help. If I have a reading of 0 coming out of the reactor then it is helping. As far as the sand bed goes I didnt suck out a major area of my sand bed. What I did was vaccum the sand in one corner area about 6" by 6". Next week I will do a little more. Regardless there was a lot of crap in that corner of the tank and the water looked like coffee
 
Sorry... guess I misread that thread over at Seachem. I thought you were actually removing or at least siphoning down to the bottom of the sand. As to whether or not the stuff actually works, I guess as long as you're happy with it then that's all that counts!
 
i have tested the water coming out of the reactor and it is lower. the point of this thread was to review the use of the product.
 
the nitrates coming out of the reactor did not stay lower for long. Incase the bacteria didnt grow in the reactor I have added some to the container I am curing the live rock and I will just cycle it with the rock.
 
Thanks for the helpful infos. I am just getting started in this hobby and was wondering about this product. Will be interested to see the final determinations. :)
 
I actually had a hard time getting it to cycle so I took the de*nitrate out of the reactor and put it in with some live rock to cycle. I will be putting it back in the reactor once it has cycled
 
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