Ozone

[_K_E_P_]

I am planning on using a 50mg/hr ozone unit for my 135G reef.

The main purpose is to improve water clarity with quality second.

The unit doesn't have a controller, so my question is
How much ozone would give good water clarity without causing dangerous ORP or other levels? 20mg? 40mg?

I realise it will be different for every tank, but just really wanted to know when you really start to push the envelope

Thanks
Kyle

[Billybeau1]

I do not recommend running an ozone unit without a controller. There are too many variables.

You really never know without a monitor whether you are pushing the envelop or not.

[avallon]

The ozone should be used to optimise the skimmer in the the sump where it is released and cannot return to the main tank.It certalnly works well and the water quality jumps up but you really need a probe and a conroller even if only to see how it is doing,avallon

[Randy Holmes-Farley]

[welcome]

I too would recommend some way to measure ORP, even if you do not use a controller (I do not, I just use an ORP meter).

That said, very low doses can probably be handled OK without a meter.

I discuss all these issues here:

Ozone and the Reef Aquarium, Part 1: Chemistry and Biochemistry
http://reefkeeping.com/issues/2006-03/rhf/index.php

Ozone and the Reef Aquarium, Part 2: Equipment and Safety
http://reefkeeping.com/issues/2006-04/rhf/index.php

Ozone and the Reef Aquarium, Part 3: Changes in a Reef Aquarium upon Initiating Ozone
http://reefkeeping.com/issues/2006-05/rhf/index.php

from the second one:

Gauging how much ozone is necessary is not trivial, and may depend strongly on the desired outcome from dosing ozone, how it is used and the other husbandry practices used in the aquarium. Clearing up yellowing in the water, for example, uses far less ozone than is necessary to sterilize the water. Likewise, a good ozone/water reaction chamber might allow far less ozone to be used than is required by an inefficient use in a skimmer. That being said, most guidelines suggest on the order of 0.3 to 0.5 mg O3/hr/gallon of aquarium water.



If you are going to not monitor ORP, I'd use less than that. Something less than 0.1 mg O3/hr/gallon.

[Boomer]

I would set that unit between 10 -15 mg and leave it there to be safe.

[_K_E_P_]

Thanks for the responses

So would 0.1mg / gallon be enough to remove yellowing, whereas 0.3 to 0.5 would be in the range of sterilization and requiring a meter?

Randy how much do you run?

Was planning to run around 0.25mg/gallon without controller, sounds like I will see if I can scrape together some more cash for a meter to be on the safe side

[Billybeau1]

Well if you cant afford a controller right now, at least if you could get a monitor, you'll know where you are at and can adjust accordingly.

[TwistedTiger]

I'm going to buck the trend here and say that a controller is nice but definitely not required. I know a couple of reefers who run their ozone at low levels on a timer with no problems and another reefer with an awsome SPS tank that simply runs it when ever he feels he needs it. I have been running mine at 20mg/hr on a 75 for an hour at a time twice a day with great success and zero problems. It should be used with caution and you should watch your tank closely but all the expensive equipement isn't required.

[Randy Holmes-Farley]

I do not believe that any reefers effectively sterilize the water, as I show in the articles. I do think that low doses may help with yellowing, but may take longer to clear the water. I use a 100 mg/h ozone unit on my system that has about 300 gallons or so. My ORP never rises above about 325 mV.

[Paul B]

As a reference I have been using 50mg/hr ozone in my 100 gallon reef without a controller since about 1980. I never shut it off except for cleaning. I can't say if it helps anything because I never had it off but I can say it hasen't hurt anything. Of course thats in my tank which as Randy and Boomer can tell you is a little wierd.

Paul

[Randy Holmes-Farley]

Of course thats in my tank which as Randy and Boomer can tell you is a little wierd.




Not at all. I think everyone here aspires to have beer bottles in the tank. We just can't think of the best way to incorporate them.

[Boomer]

Well since everyone is fessing-up here, I ran my 55 gal tanks set at 10 mg, with a net 35 gals, which is .3 mg for 20 years. It was only the last few years I monitored it and it was never over 400mV. But the is me

I do not believe that any reefers effectively sterilize the water

Not even close, the contact time is not long enough. You could do it in a big reactor with high O3 and a slow flow rate.

[TekCat]

Very interesting... sorry for jumping in.... but I'd rather not use skimmer as a reaction vessel. I want skimmer to skimm and that's it. What would be a good O3 reaction chamber (device) lets say for 90G tank?

[Boomer]

D^2 post

[Boomer]

There is only one good one unless you want to build one.

http://www.marinetechnical.com/

[Randy Holmes-Farley]

What would be a good O3 reaction chamber (device) lets say for 90G tank?

I show my DIY unit here:

Ozone and the Reef Aquarium, Part 2: Equipment and Safety
http://reefkeeping.com/issues/2006-04/rhf/index.php


specifically here:

http://reefkeeping.com/issues/2006-04/rhf/index.php#21

Ozone Reaction Chamber: Tubing Reactor



--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

After messing with the Coralife Ozone reactor and finding it unsatisfactory, and doing some tests where I simply sent the ozone into my skimmer (making my basement stink of ozone), I decided to set up a very simple "reactor" myself (Figure 8). I have two Iwaki 30 RLXT pumps in series that I have used for years as my main return pumps. I created a "T" off of their output to send water to my two main tanks.

Using another "T" I added a ¾" venturi, and to it I attached a 100' coil of ¾" HDPE (high density polyethylene) tubing that I bought from Cole Parmer for about $60 (including shipping). The reactor simply consists of the air/ozone mixture pumped into the venturi, and then the water/air/ozone mixture circulates through this coil (about 13 individual coils) for about 45 seconds (when the water's flow rate is about 90 gallons per hour). It contains a little over two gallons of air and water at a time. This allows for a long contact time with a significant amount of water, and a fair amount of pressure exists both from gravity and from the back pressure of 100' of coiled tubing. In fact, the tubing coil had to be laid horizontally. Hanging it vertically created too much back pressure to get any significant water flow through it.

While the mixing efficiency is apparently not especially good inside the tubing, it is adequate to raise the ORP to > 680 mV and the ozone concentration in the water (as measured with a chlorine kit at the outflow) to 0.1 ppm chlorine equivalent. In this setup, the venturi simply acts as an inlet for the pumped air because the flow rate is too low to actually get any suction by venturi action.

Most important to me, the end of the tubing where the air and water exit is easily passed through a column of GAC to remove residual ozone and ozone by-products. In normal operation I smell no ozone in the basement room where the operation takes place. There is also no place for any detritus to collect in this system, except on the activated carbon itself. The GAC column is detailed later in this article.




Figure 8. The 100' coil of HDPE tubing that I used as a simple ozone reactor.

[TekCat]

Randy, this is pretty cool and DIYable even to me. A few qestions:
Do you use airpump to force air in?
What kind of ozone generator do you use?
Is that tubing flexible enough to be able to tighten the diameter of coils? (space saver)

Thanks

[Randy Holmes-Farley]

You might be able to tighten the coils, but not a lot without risking a kink. HDPE is pretty stiff.

There are a lot more details in the article below:

Ozone and the Reef Aquarium, Part 3: Changes in a Reef Aquarium upon Initiating Ozone
http://reefkeeping.com/issues/2006-05/rhf/index.php


from it:

Ozone was supplied by a 100 mg/hr Aqua Medic corona discharge ozone generator. In most cases, an Optima air pump sent the air through a Red Sea air dryer (500 g model) and then into the ozone generator. I also experimented with a Tetratec Deep Water air pump, with little difference noticed.

[TekCat]

Thanks Randy!
* back to reading *

[Randy Holmes-Farley]

You're welcome.

Good luck.

[Tombsy]

There is this one too.
It's seems to be working pretty good especially for the price. $88.00

I'm running a 500g air dryer, Luft pump, 200mv Red Sea controller and a MTC SR-14 carbon reactor.

It came with instructions, media, ballvalves, check valve, all the fittings, clamps and tubing. Some of the fittings are even pre-wrapped with teflon tape.

And a lifetime warranty.

Here's some pics.





http://www.aqualifesupport.com/getDetail.php?ID=306003

And thanks for the great articles Randy.

[TekCat]

Tombsy, I assume that you're using it on your 220g tank. Do you know what ORP level this setup produces without limiting O3 with controller?

[Fishbulb2]

I have an Aqua-medic CO2 reactor from back in my planted tank days. Could that work as an ozone reactor? Also what kind of check valve can you use that's ozone safe?
FB

[Tombsy]

No I couldn't tell you how much of output would balance the ORP without the controller. It raised my ORP from 270 to about 360 the output is set at about 125mg/hr but it is still cycling on and off.
Some peoples tanks seem to have higher ORP without ozone so it would be hard to tell how much you would need.
If you need to measure the ORP anyway might as well go with a unit with a controller.

For fishbulb2- the Won checkvalve they sent with the reactor is supposed to be safe for ozone. I might be wrong but I think CO2 and ozone reactors are the same principle. You just need to add carbon filtering for the water and air.

[Randy Holmes-Farley]

Generally you want to well mix the water and the air/ozone mixture that is added. A converted CaCO3/CO2 reactor may not have adequate mixing to ensure good penetration of the ozone into the water.