# DIY co2 question



## cassiusclay (Feb 19, 2007)

ill start by stating the obvious.....im poor, and have been trying new and different things in the DIY co2 area to make my 40 gallon work and heres what ive come up with:for around 2 months i was running 4 bottles, 2 on a diffuser and 2 to an in tank reactor and changing them weekly, my drop checker would always fall blue after about 6 days. around a week ago i labeled the bottles 1&2 and have want to change them every 7 days around 4 days apart from each other like change #1 bottles on Monday and #2 bottles on Thursday. do you guys think this will help stabilize my co2 levels? im pretty much just trying to not have to go pressurized due to my extreme lack of funds. my set up is kinda high light 151 PC PPS-Pro dosing.any way i can make this work?the BBA and staghorn is getting annoying.


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## hoppycalif (Apr 7, 2005)

Staggering the change days will help a lot in keeping the amount of CO2 in the water stable. Reducing the amount of light would help too, as well as keeping the lights on for only 8 hours a day.


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## Carissa1 (Aug 25, 2007)

What recipe are you using for your yeast mixture? That can make a big difference too. What I've been doing with my 32g is alternating two bottles, each week I take one bottle off and dump out half the water, and then add another 1/2 cup of sugar and water to fill, and some houseplant food and 1/2 tsp baking soda (since my tap water has no buffer). My starter recipe is 1/4 tsp yeast, 2/3 cup sugar, one dropperful of liquid houseplant food, and 1tsp baking soda. The reason for dumping off half the water is that I'm getting rid of ethanol (which will eventually kill your yeast if it builds up too much), and then of course adding more sugar for fuel for the yeast. Eventually I suppose my yeast will die and I will need to start over fresh. The reason I know they are still alive is that when I dump off half the water, the solution is not sweet. So this tells me that the yeast converted almost all the sugar over. If it was sweet, but not producing, I would know that the yeast must have died.


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## Hashbaz (Apr 23, 2006)

When I ran DIY CO2 I used wine yeast and was very happy with it. Each batch would last about a month. I bought "premier cuvee" yeast off ebay. Do you have a way of measuring the bubble count for each bottle? This makes it a lot easier to analyze/compare your setups and try new things.


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## Squawkbert (Jan 3, 2007)

Best recipe for bread yeast... by volume, 3 parts water to one part sugar. Add yeast.

In regular shaped bottles, this recipe will go almost a month. I suspect that going w/ shorter, fatter bottles will allow a larger yeast population to use the sugar faster, so you get more CO2 for fewer days.

The 3:1 ratio allows the sugar to run out just as the alcohol conc. reaches dangerous (to yeast) levels.

Buy sugar in bulk (25 or 50LB bags), it's cheaper that way.

Baking soda's purported function is to keep the pH stable as the sugar is depleted and CO2 saturates the reactor. The problem is that Na ions are harder on most yeast species than the change in pH is, so leave it out.

If you have a long tubing run, get "CO2 proof" tubing.


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## skinns (Apr 8, 2004)

I have had used the following for my yeast recipe

- tsp of protein powder
- tsp of baking soda
- tbs of yeast
- 1 cup of sugar
- water
- Glass defuser

it seems to work good, although I don't measure my co2.


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## cassiusclay (Feb 19, 2007)

hey folks thanks for the input. im using 1/2 tsp yeast 2 cups sugar and thats it in a 2 liter bottle i have a red sea drop checker its usually green but used to fall blue after a few days and so far my new scheme seems to be working.has any one had experience working with beer yeast its all i can find right now and dont want to order any since it is rather hot out here in the states.right now my bubble counters give me 3 bps out of each 2 bottle system but no true count on each individual bottle. i wish i knew what the PPM co2 was but im not sure what the red sea values are any one know of a place i can find it???
squawbert: i have found that baking soda does not help my system.like you said when i tried that my co2 would run about the same amount of time and production was grievously slowed so im in total agreement with ya there.


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## hoppycalif (Apr 7, 2005)

If you use the Red Sea drop checker with 4 dKH distilled or DI water in it, instead of tank water, it will be green when the tank water has about 30 ppm of CO2 in it. If you use 2 dKH water, it will be green at about 15 ppm CO2. So, you decide how much CO2 you want, then mix up some grocery store distilled water with baking soda to get the appropriate KH, add enough pH reagent to it to get an easy to see color, and you will have the amount of CO2 you want when the color becomes green. Making your own 2 or 4 dKH distilled water isn't at all easy, but it can be done. The secret is to mix a tiny bit of baking soda (Arm and Hammer Baking Soda, for example) in about a quart of distilled water. Then measure the dKH of the water with your KH test kit, and dilute some of that water with more distilled water until you finally get to about the KH you want. Fortunately distilled water only costs about a dollar for a gallon.


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## voshod (Mar 22, 2007)

my two cents: what seems to work for me is to mix 1/8 teaspoon of baking soda in 1 liter of distilled water and then delute this mix in 1:4 portion (one part mix, four parts water) with water. It got pretty close to 4dKH in my case. 

of course I assume my KH test kit is accurate ...


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## Carissa1 (Aug 25, 2007)

I'm going to try out not using baking soda next time and see if there's any difference. What I found with adding more than 1/4 tsp of yeast was that my production went way way up but only stayed there for three days. I almost got up to dangerous levels of co2 when I tried the 1 tsp recipe. When I used more than 2/3 cup sugar it would die before using up all the sugar. With 2/3 cup to start it stays alive so I can keep refilling it and not use any more yeast. There's probably wide variations depending on the yeast itself and the properties of your tap water, temperature, etc.


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## cassiusclay (Feb 19, 2007)

hey hoppy DI=distilled?


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## hoppycalif (Apr 7, 2005)

cassiusclay said:


> hey hoppy DI=distilled?


DI = deionized, water that has gone thru a reverse osmosis filter with deionizing added. Grocery stores generally sell distilled water, or at least they do in my area of the world. The object is to have water that has no ions in it - no carbonates, phosphates, sulfates, etc.


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## Squawkbert (Jan 3, 2007)

For our purposes, deionized & distilled will yield the same results.


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## cassiusclay (Feb 19, 2007)

Squawkbert said:


> For our purposes, deionized & distilled will yield the same results.


ok all i needed to know


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## mistergreen (Mar 3, 2007)

or lower your lights 

it'll save you all the CO2 headach.

I use regular yeast and it lasts 3-4 weeks in a 2 liter bottle.. I add a little fert in the mixture, NO3 & PO4. Make sure not to add too much sugar.. It could be toxic to the yeast if too much. I add 1-2 cups of sugar


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## cassiusclay (Feb 19, 2007)

yeah i took the 55w bright kit off it just simply wasnt working. indicator was a different color every day.oh well looks like ill have to set up another tank now to use that 55w hate when that happens :-D
EDIT:is my glosso gonna start growing up now due to this its only 2.4 wpg?


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## mistergreen (Mar 3, 2007)

what's your CO2 diffusing method? Maybe the problem lies there. 
2.4 wpg shoukd be fine for most plants given nuitrients & CO2.


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## cassiusclay (Feb 19, 2007)

i have one diffuser a small one and an in tank DIY reactor heres the journal http://www.aquaticplantcentral.com/forumapc/aquascaping/41316-new-40g-journal.html
ive been dosing PPS-Pro for around 3 weeks now switched from seachems method also dose excel ill give the new lighting a few weeks and see how the tank reacts


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## cassiusclay (Feb 19, 2007)

so if im using water 1 dKh and the checker is yellow what am i at?


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## mistergreen (Mar 3, 2007)

here's a howto
http://www.aquaticplantcentral.com/...aquarium-projects/32100-diy-drop-checker.html


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## hoppycalif (Apr 7, 2005)

cassiusclay said:


> so if im using water 1 dKh and the checker is yellow what am i at?


With 1 dKH distilled water in the drop checker, and the color yellow - pH = 6 or so, you have about 20-30 ppm of CO2. But, the color would still be yellow if the pH were 5.5, so the CO2 could be much higher. That's why using a KH that gives a green color at the desired ppm of CO2 is so much better.


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## cassiusclay (Feb 19, 2007)

my pH is 7.0-7.2 on average


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