GFO and Vodka Question

[rich19020]

I currently run GFO, ROX and RedSea NoPox. My phospate I struggle with so I change my high capacity GFO every two weeks to keep it low. I don't have a problem with No3 as long as I run the NoPox.

I was reading up on vodka dosing and I thought it was suggested not to dose vodka and run GFO at the same time. Is that correct? I can't imgaine that vodka by itself will keep phosphates under control.

Second question: I currently does around 5ml of the NoPox daily can I start with the same amount of vodka?

Third Question: I currently use an autodoser for my NoPox. I drilled a small hole in the cap and run sugurical tubing inside the bottle. Can I do the same with the vodka? My concern is does it have to be an airtight fitting since alchol evaporates easily?

[reeftivo]

You'd be surprised at how well Vodka will work.

I personally only use vinegar because of the reports of some cyano outbreaks with vodka.

Vinegar doesn't seem to promote cyano like other forms of carbon dosing. At least I have no issues since running the vinegar.

The key is you don't want to run them at start up in conjunction with one another because together they will bring down your PO4 too rapidly and lead to shock in the system.

the animals need time to adjust

I'd say start with the vodka if you so chose, and let levels come down slowly. Then when levels are within acceptable params you can run a smaller amount of GFO to keep things stable. I think 5ml would be fine to start but I'm not a vodka doser. I dose 15ml daily of vinegar to my system and it works well. My PO4 is consistantly .003 or lower with my hanna unit.

Good luck

Tivo

[HighlandReefer]

The old adage "garbage in garbage out", hold true with phosphate. The biggest source of phosphate in your reef tank as long as you use rodi water is fish foods which are quite high in phosphate. If you overfeed fish, they will excrete excess phosphate. Using low phosphate foods will help and limiting your feeding habits or resorting to spot feeding fish will help a lot. ;)

Keep in mind that the amount of phosphate removed by carbon sources (vodka) is much lower than the amount of nitrate removed. Dosing carbon sources is more for maintain phosphate levels and nitrate levels, but can be used to decrease both over time. If nitrate is low, then perhaps changing out your GFO more often will help. If the phosphate is high say over 0.5 ppm than changing GFO at least weekly may be necessary to reduce it below 0.03 ppm. Also rocks and sand can absorb phosphate and slowly release it back into the water column, which will take longer to lower high phosphate levels. At high enough phosphate levels, GFO can become saturated in 24 hrs. :)

[rich19020]

I'm sorry for the confusion in my questions.

I really want to stop spending the money on the RedSea NoPox and I figured vodka was alot cheaper.

My phospates are under control as long as I use the GFO.

So if I start the vodka dose I don't need to worry about my phosphates getting too low to quick. I was curious do you run the GFO and the vodka or vinegar at the same time?

I'm sure I can look this up but I'll ask anyway out of laziness. Are more and more people using vinegar over vodka now? I understand you had better luck with it. Is that a common issue using vodka?

[Spyderturbo007]

Good questions rich19020. I'm considering vodka dosing right now and have some of the same questions. My PO4 is pretty high and I want to get that down. My big question is do you just add it to the sump once a day or does it have to added slowly throughout the day?

[bertoni]

Larger vodka doses might need to be split up, but you can get started by dosing it once a day.

Vinegar and vodka are alternatives. Some people have success with one, some with the other.

[Steve Wright2]

I'm sorry for the confusion in my questions.

I really want to stop spending the money on the RedSea NoPox and I figured vodka was alot cheaper.

My phospates are under control as long as I use the GFO.

So if I start the vodka dose I don't need to worry about my phosphates getting too low to quick. I was curious do you run the GFO and the vodka or vinegar at the same time?

I'm sure I can look this up but I'll ask anyway out of laziness. Are more and more people using vinegar over vodka now? I understand you had better luck with it. Is that a common issue using vodka?

I have used in progression Bio Fuel, which is the Brighwell version of the Red Sea product you are using
I then moved to Vodka
and lately I have switched to white vinegar, for reasons as listed by previous posters

I have no idea of the relative strenght of the Red Sea product and would advise starting with less than 5 mils of Vodka should you go with that method

I would gradually phase one out whilst bringing the other one in, and monitor as you do so

I would cut the Red Sea dose to 3 mils and dose 1 mil of vodka ( or 8 mils of vinegar if you decide to use vinegar not Vodka)
I would do this for 1 week
next week I would dose 1 mil of the red sea product, and 2 mils of Vodka or 16 mils of vinegar
week 3 , I would cease dosing Red Sea product and dose either 3 mils of Vodka or 24 mils of vinegar

you can then either increase or decrease as needed during subsequent weeks
(if your N and P are testing zero, and your tank glass cleaning and general tank appearance is good, then lowering the amount you are dosing is an option, you can always increase in increments if needed as you go along)

most dosing systems will not work very well when drawing liquids from air tight containers , you need air entering the container in order the liquid can be drawn out ( think making one small hole in a tin of fluid, nothing comes out, unless you make another hole, so that air rushes in forcing the liquid through the 1st one)

I have dosed Vodka direct from the bottle, just made the hole large enough for the airline to fit in with a small amount of slack (not a tight fit)

I dose Vinegar from the bottle in the same manner, and in fact I just remove the cap on the bottle that has nearly finished and place a new bottle under the cap ( saves me making a new hole everytime I replace the vinegar bottle)

I still use GFO 24/7 , for the reasons stated above in that Phosphates are often not the limiting factor in terms of what carbon dosing can achieve
so the conbination of a carbon source and GFO has been most effective for me

hope the above helps

Steve

[rich19020]

Great advice. Thanks

[Spyderturbo007]

I started dosing Vinegar last night, based on some comments by Randy Holmes-Farley about the advantages of using vinegar over vodka.

[nmouncey]

I started vodka dosing my 100 g reef and 20 g frag tanks.

I started with 4 drops 2x day in the 100 g and about 3 drops 2x a day in the frag tank.

I have been at it for about a week and today doubled the 100 g tank amounts and not quite doubled the frag tanks amounts.

I also run GFO and carbon in my sump.

What I noticed immediately was the water clarity. I thought the water was clear before. Within a few hours, the water was invisible, only the surface moving let you know there was water there. In my reef tank especially...the fish seem to be flying through the sky.
I have had no outbreak of any sort in the big tank. The sump pulls much darker gunk out now....black instead of dark green. I still get small amounts of brown algae on my walls....but now it requires a light wipe down every 3 days or so..instead of nearly every day.

The frag tank was different.

I started too high a dose, even though I did the math of how much to start with very carefully. I started with closer to 6 drops 2x a day. While the water was sparkling clean within 2-3 hours...I had some red slime even faster than that.

What I noticed though was it only appeared on a couple Acan Lord frags and a neon trumpet that had some skeleton showing from a previous heat issue. 85 degrees will strip some things down really fast (on a side note....the other things in there mushrooms, Fungia, other Acans, Acros, Frogspawn, Zoas, many premium Palys, encrusting Montis, big colony of Star Polyps and a large Toadstool etc. SEEMED TO LOVE THE HIGH HEAT 83-85 degrees Everything was very full looking...lots of feeding corals day and night)

So I backed off the dose by a couple drops and everything settled down. I used a turkey baster to blow the red slime off the covered corals and into the filter area. While it stained some of the skeleton red/brown, nothing has returned.

A week later and I have slowly added another couple drops to the frag tank 2x a day also. I still get some brown algae on the walls like in the big tank...but much less and less frequently.

I did not undertake this lightly but after dialing in on everything else I could think of (i.e. amount of feeding, RODI water TDS check, etc) and I was still facing the algae, I decided to take drastic measures.

It has not effected some Bryopsis I have. But on the recommendation of some trusted people.....I blasted the tank with a lot more Magnesium than I thought safe....about 1/3 of a bottle of Tech M....waited a day and did it again.....waited another day and did it again.....the tank seems fine and the Bryopsis has withered like wheat in drought. Just sort of "dried up" and died.

There have been no apparent ill effects to anything in either tank, other than the ugliness of the red slime in the frag tank...that really only effected 3 frags specifically..and for obvious reasons. Also, none of the slimmed corals seemed any worse for wear, probably because I washed them carefully to keep the healthy tissue from being injured.

Hope some live-time, real-world experience helps someone. All I could find was anecdotal info when I was making my decision. A lot of "I think....." and "My friend had a friend who tried..."

Good luck. Do the math carefully if you go down this path. It really is about DROPS and QUARTER ML measures in the beginning.

All the best,

Nat