Passive kalk reactor

[jgoldsney]

I have had an idea bouncing around in my head for a bit and would appreciate some feed back.

I currently top off from the basment up to a second story bonus room. I have a float switch that controls the solenoid on an irrigation valve. I have been dripping Kalk off and on and frankly my schedule has been way to hectic to do it consistantly.

I was going to put a kalk reactor in the tank stand but space limitations and concerns of Kalk leaking on to the floor have made me re-think this.

I was wondering if a kalk reactor that was completely passive i.e. no pump or stirrer would be of any use. What I am envisioning is a fairly tall reactor (36" or so) that would have a center tube that is glued to the bottom. Kalk would be piled around this center tube 10-12" deep. this tube would run up to the top. The feed line would exit at the botom of the outer area under the kalk and the water out take would be at the botom of the center tube. This way the water would have to travel up throught the Kalk and back down to the outlet.

If once a week or so I went and gave the reactor a small shake to prevent the water from making large tunnels through the Kalk do you think this would be of any benifit?

http://www.canreef.com/photopost/data/500/kalkreactor.jpg

[Joe Reefer]

I have been using the tunze calcium dispenser (http://www.jlaquatics.com/phpstore/store_pages/details/supplies.php?product_ID=tz-kalkdis)for sometime now, it works on the same principal as you are talking about. I would not recomend doing it because it just does not stir the kalk enough, it does help a little though, and giving it a shake once a day is not convient for me. The problem is the flow through the chamber is not enough to keep the water inside saturated with kalk. I would just go with a actual kalk stirer or reactor. IMO

PS: I will have my dispenser for sale soon if your interested in trying it.

[jgoldsney]

I guess the main difference in what I was thinking i of would be size. Seing as how it was going to be down in my furnace room looks & size don't matter that much. The main reason that I wanted to go with this method is that the reactor would be 2 floors below the tank this would mean that the reactor would have to be able to hold a bit of pressure and I am leary about the strength of the joint between a pump and the reactor

[jgoldsney]

A quick idea for stirring would be to attach it to a cheap palm sander and put the sander on a timer and let it shake the reactor for me a couple of times a day......

[Joe Reefer]

Your going to need a pretty big sander to do any good. Maybe you could pick up a used paint shaker from home depot or rona. That otta do the trick.:mrgreen:

[danny zubot]

You could run a small power head on a closed loop on the passive reactor, and run it on a timer. That way your feed is still from the top up.

[WWWD]

You could run a small power head on a closed loop on the passive reactor, and run it on a timer. That way your feed is still from the top up.

then it's basically an 'active' kalc reactor.

[BCOrchidGuy]

J, if your main concern is pressure around the fittings/pump then why not build a rectangular with square sides reactor and use bulkheads. A Mag 250 would stir it if you put it on a timer, or you could glue up a maxijet 1200 as they are probably better for on off operations plus they are much cheaper (less expensive). I used a small passive reactor and it worked fine, I added vinegar to the fresh water and I never noticed any trails or other oddities. Like you say, give it a smack every few days and see how it works. Mine just had rigid airline tubing that went from the top to 1/8 of an inch from the bottom, this is the tube the fresh water came in through, I had another rigid airline tube that was flush with the inside of the top of the canister, this is where the water came out. Like fonix, it werked fer me.

[Bryan]

Here is my thread for something similar. Works very well and I have been using it for about quite a fe months.

http://reefcentral.com/forums/showthread.php?s=&threadid=1004787