Ozone

[H.crispa]

I just bought a small ozonator. Anyone have any experience with these? My intent is to maintain my redox at a better level as I do tend to feed the crap out of my fish (literally I suppose!). Yes, I am aware that if overdone it will kill everything etc. and I suppose that at some point I'll invest in an ORP controller but for now I plan to run it a half hour at a time then see what the results are before I run it another half hour-- on and off a couple times a month just to manage dissolved organic carbon sources a little better. Interesting sidenote: One of the things that can generate ozone is UV light so those of you running UV sterilizers are, by default, generating a small amount of ozone in your systems via exposure of dissolved oxygen to the UV light. Pretty cool I think.

[H.crispa]

I have been running my ozone into my skimmer for a couple hours now on the lowest setting. Not even running the discharge through carbon before reentering the tank. I am watching everything really closely though. What I am seeing is quite amazing. My corals are extending their poyps farther than I have ever seen before. Both of my hydnophoras look like wooly mamoths and my anemone is easily 1/3 larger than normal. I dare say that my ORP was too low. I'll wager as well the increased polyp extention may have to do with higher oxygen levels. This will also have the additional benefit of killing pathogens exposed to the O3. I'll unplug it tonight and resume in the AM.

[H.crispa]

Okay. After much research, I have determined to my satisfaction, that hobby grade ozone generators are incapable of producing ozone in quantities large enough to escape the skimmer. Therefore I'm leaving it on the lowest setting all night. I won't go to bed till about 3 AM so it will only be unsupervised for a few hours anyway. In the AM, I'll crank it up to maximum and watch the tank really closely to see what happens.

From what I've read so far, most experts are saying that ozone in the low levels hobby grade units are capable of is pretty much as harmless as using carbon-- not as a direct quote but since ozone is so highly reactive, it is all used up before it leaves the skimmer. Any that may actually get into the tank (unlikely in the first place) will be of such small quantity that it will react with something in the water column before it ever reaches a fish or coral.

That said, many of these experts do recomment an ORP controller to be on the safe side. Yeah. Right. Since when do I play by the rules??? I'll watch it for a few days using low levels and I'll bet it'll be just fine.

They recommend ORP monitors because ozone is so highly reactive-- which is why it works in the first place. It's kind of like gasseous bleach. But even bleach isn't a big deal if it is diluted enough. Most of us drink bleach every day-- can you say chlorinated tap water?

I'll even bet that a person could add one drop of bleach per hour to a 75 gallon tank for 24 hours and not kill one single thing. Might not be the best idea but there are already plenty of products for reef tanks that are strong liquid oxidizers-- like potassium permangenate (A.K.A. Poly-Ox and Mar-oxy). And just what do you suppose is in that stuff from Boyd Enterprises called "chemi-clean"??? It says that you should monitor O2 levels during treatment. I wonder why? Probably because it either directly oxydizes or it facilitates the process. In either case it causes ORP to raise somehow. A little hydrogen peroxide will do the same thing. So will a little chlorine bleach. The trick is to keep it all within safe levels. Boy am I talking about some off the wall stuff here or what?

Seriously, don't add bleach to your tank. I'm kidding. Nuff said.

[H.crispa]

OK. After running the ozone for several days now I am very impressed. My livestock is looking great and as I predicted, the skimmer is being kept cleaner. The thing is, the effect is more pronounced than I anticipated. I normally have to clean a thick brown layer of muck from the column every other day. It remains completely clean after three days now. Also, the amount of skimmate is reduced and it is not as viscous-- presumably because the nasties are being burned up instead of belched into a cup. In any case this is a good thing. My water is absolutely sparkling and I am still blown away by the positive response of my anemone and corals! Check out how happy my blastomusa is:
http://www.netpix.org/pix/01/11/05/blasto-web.jpg

[MattG]

glad to hear the ozone is working out! ive been toying with the ID of adding an ozone unit for some time now. Keep up with the updates.

[H.crispa]

I kicked the unit up to full blast 24 hours ago and no ill consequences. This is a 25mg/hr corallife unit and my tank is a 75 gallon. My skimmer is an Aquaclear Aquatics 150 hang on tank model (The company out of Jacksonville FL). I am forcefeeding it air in addition to that drawn in by the venturi via an air diffuser on the end of a rigid air line run straight through the center of the skimmer body and driven by a double diaphragm air pump with both outlets combined into one tube.

The skimmate is now drastically reduced in volume and is much less viscous. Now even the frogspawn and the screaming green meanies are out fully. After the bulb upgrade they were kind of not too happy. I thought it was due to the higher light intensity but I am now convinced that they simply could not make use of it before because the dissolved O2 levels were too low. If this theory is correct, I should see some explosive growth over the next few weeks.

I am now a serious champion of ozone. Oh, and did I mention that slime algae does not stand a chance in a tank running ozone?

[sherm71tank]

I just added an ozone unit to my tank. The More-Zon 30 I read that it will produce up to 120 mg/hour. It is adjustable and when I turn that thing up it really gives off a STRONG ozone smell. I have it turned all the way down and running thru my skimmer now, I have an ORP controller on the way and will then experiment with different amounts of output. I have a very nice elegance coral in my tank that is doing well, been in there for a few about 4 months now and it seems to be growing. It does look like it is extended farther since I started using the zon. Thanks for sharing.

[david540i]

I too have been toying with the idea of adding a MORE-ZON 30. Let me know the results. I've got a 55 now and planning on upgrading to a 90(If I ever find one).

Just a question, how much did you give for that MORE-ZON 30?

[Reef4Fun]

H.crispa, I added bleach to my tank and now everything looks really bad! :(

OK, no of course I didn't. But I have been thinking of getting one of those units, how much do they run? My tank is a 120gal., I use RO/DI water and a great skimmer

[H.crispa]

Beats me. That was a sweet grop buy and they are all waaaay gone. Look at some of my other posts on ozone and you should find more than one link to a really affordable bigtime O3 gen. Probably need a controller w/it bc it is so big. Sweet deal though.

[essop3]

I paid like $30 on ebay for a HUGE unit. 250 mg or something. I just run it for a few hours every now and then (when I'm not home)