Denitrator what one.

[paveking1]

I am currently in the process of buying a denitrator .I was wondering if any of you reef experts use one & if you do what one works the best.I am currently looking at the korallin.

[widmer]

read the sulfur denitrifier thread, make one yourself, spend only $15, unless you have money coming out of your ears.

[Roy G. Biv]

This one seems to be popular..

http://www.aquaripure.com/

[paveking1]

Thanks that one looks pretty easy to setup& maintain.

[uncleant]

take a look at my Diy sulfur denitrifer thread
http://reefcentral.com/forums/showth...9#post11600659

[sanababit]

paveking, dont spend all that money, look at uncleant's thread

[Pirate@40]

I use a Korallin and it works fine. I don't think the brand makes a big difference. Midwest is just as good, perhaps better in some respects. Don't expect to get to zero, just expect to maintain somewhere between 5 and 10 without water changes. If you have zero nitrates going into the reactor, the bacteria die off and you will get that hydrogen sulfide, rotten egg, smell. It needs to operate in anaerobic conditions which are fairly slow drip rates. With the size of tanks you have, you may get tank turn over rates of 10-15 days if you buy the largest Korallin unit. I would recommend nitrate testing with high resolution. Salifert is good.

[wrott]

I use a Midwest w/ no complaints.

[packer]

I love my midwest and its been flawless for over two years running! Tell Rick you belong to RC and you might even get a discount??

[xinumaster]

get a cheap calcium reactor and convert it to a sulfur denitrator.

[corals b 4 bills]

I agree with Pirate@40 with denitrators you can only expect to max out at 5 to 10 ppm, my trates were 80 to 100 and things were dying in my tank (long story) but after installing the Korallin 1502 my trates hover around 8, not too shabby and everyone's happy as a clam. I'm too busy to build my own DIY ( I build things from scratch all day long anyways) but this things pretty much plug-n-go.

[SEAN888]

Here's a link

http://www.aquaripure.com/index.htm

they seem to work great, they say all you have to add is sugar water or vodka I am thinking of getting one! they allso state that nitrates will be kept at zero.

[paveking1]

Thanks for all the help everybody .I just put a order in for the aquaripure.My nitrates are not too high they hover around the 20 mark.I have everything you can get to reduce them except this so i will try this & see. The korallin & deltec are nice units but wow $700 to $1000 for a denitrator hmm. I already have a korallin 4002 calcium reactor which was a $1000 with all the extras .I will try this one first & see .Thanks again everybody.

[packer]

I would stay away from the aquariapure as you need to "feed" it, and that can be very hard to keep on schedule and can be messed up quick. I think midwest ones run around 400 complete.

[corals b 4 bills]

The Midwest and the Korallin 1502 range around $380, where did you get the $700 figure?

[paveking1]

Hey corals b 4 bills where do they sell the midwest unit. I talked to you before about the koralias powerheads & have switched to all tunzes they are as good as they claim to be . I'm glad i switched to them .I have 2 6100s& 2 6000s with the controller. Thanks

[david pinder]

does anyone make one for a 1400 gal system?

[SEAN888]

Originally posted by paveking1
Thanks for all the help everybody .I just put a order in for the aquaripure.

Let me no if it works good.

[Pirate@40]

David,
Not sure about Midwest, but Korallin makes several sizes. the larger size S-4002 is rated to 700 gallons so you would just get two of them. I would think running them separately would work best, but you could rig them in series as well.
All,
Regarding achieving zero nitrates and why you won't, think of it this way. Let's say you have a 100 gallons including tank, sump, refugium and equipment. The denitrator is not changing the rate at which nitrates are being produced, it is only removing them. Your tank specimens are still producing waste which is turning to ammonia at the same rate. The ammonia is still being consumed by the nitrosomonas at the same rate and converted to nitrites. The nitrites are consumed by the nitrobacter and nitrates are produces at the same rate. Both the the nitrosomonas and the nitrobacter operate in the aerobic areas of your tank on the surfaces of the live rock and sand. Through water movement ammonia and nitrites are rapidly exposed to these colonies and thus through dilution and rapid consumption,, you can maintain near zero levels of these compounds. However, the nitrate consuming bacteria live in anaerobic zones deeper within the live rock and sand bed. Water does not move through these at a fast rate. The same is true for a denitrator. When these are set up and running, you will drip water through them at a slow rate. A good rate might be 3 drips per second. If the water goes through too fast, it won't be anaerobic and the bacteria will not survive A drop is about a tenth of a ml. At three drops per second, your running ~18 ml/min. 100 gallons is 378,541. milliliters. If you do the math, you'll find you're turning over your tank water through the denitrator in 14.6 days. Now you simply cannot maintain zero unless you are producing zero in the rest of your tank with that turn over rate. For you to have below 0.5 ppm, you would only be producing about .033 ppm per day. If that's all your producing, why bother, you'll only produce 1 ppm per month, 12 ppm per year. More likely a tank is producing about .5-1 ppm excess nitrates to day. With this turn over rate, your tank nitrates would then be between 7 and 14. If you can turn up the drip rate to get a tank turn over of 7 days, then your nitrates in the tank would be between 3.5 and 7 ppm. So just do the math and you'll realize no one is getting zero nitrates in their tank from using an anaerobic based denitrator. If you calculate your tank production rate and your turn over rate, you can calculate your tank nitrates. Send me a note if you need help with the math.

[JNye]

your math is interesting tho obviously flawed, it doesn't take into account all the variables. there are many factors at work here. if it were true denitrators would never work. they would never be able to pull down nitrates while still being produced, yet they do. maybe someone else can explain it to you.

[Pirate@40]

Not true, if they have the capacity, they will eventually match the net production rate in your tank. If you're producing a net of 1 ppm per day, they will stabilize at eliminating 1 ppm per day assuming the can house enough bacteria to do so. They will eventually balance. However, if your turn over rate is 7 days, then you will maintain 7 ppm in your tank as one is being added and one is being removed daily. They reduce nitrates from higher levels because generally they have greater capacities than the production rate. So if your tank starts with 14 with a 7 day turn over, then you're removing 2 ppm per day if the capacity is there. However once it drops to 7, it will stabilize at 1 added, one removed because you can't remove more nitrates than goes through the device. You may be able to turn your drip rate up, which will further remove them, but when you run water through them too fast, they do not remain anaerobic and they quite functioning, producing hydrogen sulfide. They will take the tank down but will stabilize removing the amount that is being produced. Only as much bacteria will survive as there is food for and as they're not nitrate magnets, they can't pull them in any faster than the flow rate. It's fair to ask questions about what you don't understand poo, but it's a bit silly to criticize or suggest something is flawed when you can't mathematically or scientifically put forth an alternate argument.

[sanababit]

amen

[wrott]

Pirate@40,
you are missing the point=decreasing nitrate.
Before I added a Midwest my nitrates were 40-80ppm. Now they are 5-10ppm consistently.
I don't understand your aversion to decreasing NO3.
It doesn't matter how loquacious your post are, Midwest works great.
I don't understand why you want high NO3 in your system??--I don't, so I did something about it--what are you doing???????????????????
I keep the flow rate at maximum on my unit--no dripping--wide open--that is the only thing that makes sense.
Your statement is untrue that the reactor will stop fuctioning if there is no NO3--there will just be a reduced amount of anaerobes--you need to take some organic chemistry classes--if it would help--to understand why H2S would not be produced by a lack of NO3. Some people.

[wrott]

Sorry, I just read your first post--if you run it at max flow rate, you will not get 'that rotten egg smell', it's late and i hope I didn't offend you too badly.
And i see that my post is pretty loquacious.

[Pirate@40]

Not offended at all. Had I read your first post without your second post apology, I would have concluded that while I may need a refresher in college level organic chemsitry, you obviously would need courses in grade school level reading comprehension. Your post wasn't particularly loquacious, it was just based on a total misinterpretation of the discussion. My denitrators work great too, I'm not opposed to them at all. I'm just trying to explain to people that they aren't going to get to zero. You are getting about what I get, so we're pretty much in agreement. Since your post suggests that you have an understanding of organic chemistry that I don't, maybe you should enlighten us all as to the cause of hydrogen sulfide production. I thought I understood it, but perhaps I'm missing something that you can explain.