Quote:
Originally Posted by Delphinus
Week 6 update.
So, sometimes you learn things by trial and error. My last week's efforts to double up the media in the reactor have had a paradoxical effect. I doubled up both the zeolites and the N/P pellets and the resulting mix is noticeably restrictive on the velocity of water running through the reactor. In turn, the bacterial mulm released upon agitation is on epic levels, far more than the tank inhabitants consume - and this in turn is contributing to a build up of nitrate back in the tank.
Meanwhile, those who are running the pellets in reactors on their own report continued reductions.
So, I will be separating the two media types into different reactors. I have a spare phosban reactor I can use for starters and will see where things go after that. I will elect to sustain or suspend zeovit independently of this. I suspect at this point that the mulm from the pellets have coated the zeolites rendering them ineffective.
"In conclusion": although I think I don't have enough datapoints to make a solid recommendation on whether it's worthwhile or not to run pellets AND zeovit together; versus just one or the other... however I do think there is a definite trend here that we can make a recommendation against running both types homogenously in the same reactor vessel.
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Personally I am still running 1L of Zeolites and 500ml of BioPellets in the same Reactor. I am seeing good results.
Tony thanks for your test results, maybe running more of both is not worthwhile, but at this point the amount and combination I have seems fine.