I'm planning to make my own co2 reactor for my 4 feet aquarium.Lets say i use the big 1.5 litre coke bottle as the reactor and fill up half of the bottle wif the mixture..when the gas in produced,will it

1.kill my fish if too much gas?(cos they need oxygen too)

2.will the gas cloud the aquarium water?

3. will the plants actually grow alot?

4.where should i place the airstone near to?

thanks if anyone can give advice.

1. let the first three hours go by for small tank. but big tank like yours no prob. just make sure aq lights is on when you first put in co2
use less yeast.
1 teaspoon is more than enough to get steady bubbling. diff batch may have diff results IMHO.
not that easy to kill your fish unless it's new setup where fish have to worry about other stuff like ammonia and nitrite.

2. no. it doesn't cloud. unless your bottle mixture accidentally burps into aq.

3. they will grow well or won't die depending if you're doing the other things right. it's like a hi-fi system you need every component in there. no co2, no source of carbon. plants 75% carbon. diy co2 helps because normal aq has teeny bit of co2 from fauna.

4.stick it to under a small powerhead that will chop and shoot the gas all over the tank.


HTH

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A single 1.5 L bottle might not produce enough for a heavily planted 4 footer. I use a 1.5 L bottle with yeast mixture filled to about 4 inches below the top for my standard two foot tank.

Make sure you have a checkvalve to prevent water from the aquarium going into the bottle.

Connecting the tube to the venturi input of a small powerhead is a good and simple way to distribute the CO2 and provide the necessary circulation in the tank.

yup, size matters...but ex marine fren once had a moss tank that look fab in a standard 4 ft tank. he liked the weekly routine of refreshing the DIY co2 bottle.

he had a chiller though...

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I use a lot of sugar + 1 teaspoon of bicarbonate + 1 teaspoon of yeast & that last me only abt 5 days.

I use much less yeast. Just a pinch (about half the small plastic spoon you get for your KFC whipped potato). I also add some protein powder and some urea for the nitrogen source. Sometimes I use molasses instead of urea and this produces a brownish mix.

My recipe is based on the following article:

http://www.aquatic-gardeners.org/Nyberg_yeast.ppt

The picture shows the stuff I use at the moment... I get about 7 days of quite good CO2 production. Without the urea/molasses the production is slower but can last more than two weeks.

Attached Images

 

Can I use milk powder as a source of protein?
Also, where to get the molasses/urea?
Thanks.

You should be able to get urea from any of the hypermarkets or hardware stores. Just go to the gardening section. It is sold as a fertilizer. 46% Nitrogen. Don't try it as a fert though...

Molasses I've found in Tesco.

As far as milk powder is concerned, I think you can use it too but I think I've read that it will smell funny at the end... Some people even use flour (serve two purposes and no wastage at all with a sourdough recipe http://www.thekrib.com/Plants/CO2/co2-ferm.html ). After all, IMHO, the whole DIY concept is to experiment with things...

what if there are toxins or poisonous elements in the ingredients that we use in the DIY?then the fishes will become "kambing korban" la..hahahah

i think abang ruslan is our expert on diy co2 and if tak percaya, read those articles first...
i tried diy long time ago but just didn't like the routine. especially when i'm overseas for two three weeks at a time...

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