Clear FX in Phosban reactor...

[sn4265]

I tried a Phosban reactor for a few weeks, but then got nervous about reading about nutrient stripping. Not sure if this was a valid concern or not, but I ended up turning off the reactor and really not worrying about it. So, I now have an unused Phosban reactor. While at a LFS I picked up a thing of Clear FX that the owner was raving about. Right now this is just loose in the sump, but I'm thinking of tossing it in the Phsoban reactor and just turning the feed pump all the way up. I'm thinking that this might get me better flow thru the Clear FX bag. Any thoughts on this?

Now, all of that said, when I read my PO4 yesterday on the Hanna it came up as 0. This was a little shocking for me, but the tank is currently fishless so maybe this isn't that odd. I do have some shrimp and CUC in the tnak with my corals and a new clam and I am feeding the tank about 5 times a week. Could my Hanna have been wrong?

Thanks in advance for any feedback.

[tmz]

I don't think you need to use it with PO4 at 0 and little to no feeding at this stage. I'd save it and use it later. Don't know if the gac, beads or other resin will blow through whatever sponge material you have in your reactor or whether the media will grind up in higher flow than the manufacturer recommends.

[sn4265]

Well... I was planning on just leaving it in the bag, and putting the bag into the reactor. The only instructions from the maunfacturer on this stuff I believe is to put it into a high flow area. My thought of putting it into the reactor is just to ensure that it is indeed getting good flow thru.

[tmz]

That sounds like it could work.

For the other part of your question. It's possible to get a 0 reading and still have PO4 if nuisance algae is in the tank taking it out of the water column. Bacteria grab some PO4 too.

[sn4265]

Ah maybe the bacteria is starting to come into play here too then. I just started dosing vinegar in my limewater ATO both as a carbon source and to raise the limewater saturation point. I was just really surprised to see 0.00 on the Hanna.

[bertoni]

The vinegar might help with the phosphate level, and 0 ppm as a reading isn't that surprising as a result for a tank that isn't getting a lot of food. My tanks pretty much always read zero, even with fish in them. I ran GFO as a sort of safety net for a while anyway, though.

The ClearFX carbon should be safe. The resins in ClearFX might be useful. If so, they'd likely be similar to Purigen. Neither the carbon nor the resins should cause any problems.

[sn4265]

Actually, your mention of Purigen reminded me that this is something I wanted to look into. I think I may actually put a bag of the ClearFX and a bag of Purigen into the Psoban reactor and see how that does. Seems like it might be a pretty good combination. I think I'll probably wait until after the fish go in though.

[Steveb]

fwiw I cut the bag into little circles to use in a TLF150. I tried it twice and both times the media tended to cake up into a large brick that was impossible for my mj1200 to push water through.