DIY CO2

Bam! Done!

On New Year's Day, I didn't have a lot going on. So when I turned on the light in the 29g, I had to take a photo of this Julii Cory sleeping in the Java Moss.

Then it was time for the CO2. I've waffled on it, but when I had this empty jug of grapefruit juice, I thought it was time. The cap is bigger and the plastic is harder than a Dr. Pepper bottle. It's almost 2 liters. I used the recipe that called for 2 cups sugar, 1/2 tsp yeast and 1 tsp baking soda. But first I had to assemble the thing. It was surprisingly easy now that I'm drill-savvy. I skipped silicone because I made the hole so much smaller than the tubing. Hopefully I don't have leaks, but I won't rule out silicone if I need it.

I added a gas separator, too, in case any sludge should make its way out of the reactor, and I popped an airstone on the end in the tank. It all went really smoothly. I put the reactor into operation around 10:30. When we came back from sledding at 1:30, it was producing bubbles. I'm not quite sure how many bubbles per second it's producing, but they're steady and they're small. The airstone is positioned right under the filter intake, and some of them are going up into it. I hope that the others are small enough that they're still doing what they need to do. I'm leery about trying to put the tube right into the intake because I don't want to damage the intake's plastic. Not sure how I'd get it in there.

the mixture added, ready to go into the tank

in place,