Does anyone run a BioDenitrator?

[Willow]

i just saw these on the marine depot site.

We have long held the view that if you design a natural system with the management of nutrients in mind, nitrate and phosphate can be almost forgotten. But with all the best laid plans, you often end up with excess nutrients. These may be due to a higher load of fish or inefficiency in the system’s denitrification abilities. Either way; even the best systems can end up with a nagging 10-20ppm of residue nitrate. The options currently available to resolve excess nitrate would normally take the route of increasing water changes, adding more live rock, or increasing things like the deep sand beds or adding mangroves.

An option that many people have tried is the slow flow denitrator. These rely on anaerobic bacteria, colonising a suitable medium and the flow of water being slow enough, to become depleted of oxygen to create an environment they can thrive in. These bacteria will then multiply and consume the nitrate in the low oxygen water. If well set-up this method can be quite successful.

looks like it might be a handy item for people with huge bioloads and nitrate problems.

http://www.marinedepot.com/aquarium_...or.asp?CartId=

[Veng68]

From what I have read about sulphur based dednitrators....... you will have to still do water cahnges because of sulphur build up in the system. The French have been using then since 1998 and they seem to have great success with them

Cheers,
Vic [veng68]

[Mitch#3]

They are referred to as SLAD reactors, old school wastewater treatment
For all the basic info on SLAD reactors and wastewater you should try this web site

http://mtac.sws.uiuc.edu/mtacdocs/fi...inalReport.pdf

They are easy to build, and in terms of aquarium literature try

Here

http://mars.reefkeepers.net/USHomePa...torSoufre.html

Here

http://mars.reefkeepers.net/USHomePa...Denitrator.htm

And here for a DIY design (which I would modify per my comments below)

http://mars.reefkeepers.net/USHomePa...ionSoufre.html



For a discussion of its use in aquariums try this link
http://aqualinkwebforum.com/eve/ubb....2/m/3536050522

The SO4 build up is not as much a problem as you would think given that levels of sulfur in mixes are lower than sulfur levels in seawater.

Mix the sulfur and the limestone (Aragonite) in a column followed by a pure aragonite column. The mix in the first chamber helps keep the ph up throughout the "sulfur" column (low ph reduces denitrtrfication rates)

Hope this helps