DIY CO2 drops when cold front comes in

[bman]

Apparently, the temperature in the room with the fish tank dropped and my CO2 production dropped with it. At first I thought it was a leak in the line, but after checking, everything was airtight.

Other than float the bottles in a tank of water hooked up with an aquarium heater, is there any other options? Turning the heat up in this room is not an option as it is in the basement with no controllable thermostat.

Is there a special additive I can add to the mix to make it more productive?

DIY CO2, what a hassle!

 

[mr funktastic]

lol gotta love DIY. the easiest option is the bucket of water and heater. when it gets to cold i put my co2 bottles next to the ballast of my light to keep them warm. seems to do the trick. but mine is also a DIY light so it makes it easier.

 

[fish_4_all]

Wine yeast seems to work better at lower temp than regular yeast. Other than that, heat the bottles in a bucket or a 10 gallon aquarium if you have 4 bottles like I do. I don't heat mine, I just deal with the drop in CO2. I know it means I will fight minor BBA and Hair/string algae but so be it. Don't have the room nor the drive to set up an aquarium just to keep my bottles at the same temp.

 

[rkilling1]

couldn't you just add another bottle of CO2? hopefully it's cool enough that the production rate is half what it was and therefore doubling up will suffice and last twice as long.

 

[Purrbox]

Quite common to run into slowed CO2 production with cooler temperatures. As others have mentioned you could place the CO2 bottles in a container with water and a heater. Another option would be something like a reptile heater pad. And finally still others have had sucess with placing the CO2 bottles on or near the light fixtures.

Adding an additional bottle would help get the levels higher during the cold season, you'd just need to be careful that it isn't too much CO2 if things warm up and the production picks up. The cooler weather would also make the mix last longer, though I have no idea how much longer.

 

[Glenc]

Not much you can do with DIY as it gets cooler. My C02 production drops as well, quite drastic as my tanks are in my basement. Bubble count goes down to almost half. Not good in my high light tanks. I put my bottles in a bucket with a heater. It is a pain but it is effective. Purrbox makes a good point. Adding another bottle would give you more production, but could be overkill if it warmed up even a little bit. Of course, that would likely happen when you were not home. Probably best to do the bucket-heater thing. It would be a bit more stable.

 

[Guest]

DIY CO2, what a hassle!

You got it! I used to keep my bottles on a heating pad and it worked well. But I ended up throwing the whole mess in the trash. The nice thing is that my plants still grow and look just as good.

 

[7Enigma]

I'm thinking of doubling my yeast amount in each batch to combat the drop in temp. Shouldn't cause any problems unless we have a heat wave while I'm at work.....

 

[bman]

Thanks for all the input, and still I am not sure what to do. I quess I will wait and see what happens. I recently added a second bottle just before the temp drop so I am a little hesitant to add a third bottle. I don't consider my tank heavily planted, maybe moderately as you can see in my sig. I still have to test to see what the exact levels are.

Maybe if I could find the right sized bucket to snugly fit the two two liters in there and still remain on the very small shelf I constructed just for them I might consider buying a small aquarium heater and keeping them warm that way. Since my tank is in the basement it will probably get colder down there and production will likely cease.

to reiterate: DIY CO2, what a hassle!

 

[czcz]

Keeping the bottles close to the lights (like behind the tank) for heat helps.

 

[evercl92]

How about insulating the bottles? Either wrap them in towels or house-insulation placed inside a 5 gallon bucket.

 

[exactionfigure]

I also have my tank in a basement that gets fairly cold in the winter months.

I put my DIY C02 in a tall Rubbermaid bin with a small hole drilled in the lid for the airline to come out I do this for two reasons, just in case the hose gets kinked or something clogs somewhere and there is an explosion it will all be contained inside the bin and also to keep the bottles warm.

I use a heavy duty wool blanket and I sort of mold it to the shape of the two bottles (it keeps its form when I take the bottles out) and this works really well to retain the temp when if you first fill it up this has worked well so far but I was also thinking of adding a small heating pad to the bin and just keeping the setting on low all the time or even better plugging it into my timer so it only heats up during the day so there will be less c02 produced at night.

Hope this helps

-Matt