Okay, July 14th, I set up a 5 pound CO2 rig on my 55 Gallon in an effort to have better plant growth, and because dosing with Excel isn't good for absent minded folks like me.
I bought a tank, regulator, solenoid, bubble counter, needle valve combo as well as a Red Sea Drop checker from Greenleaf Aquariums. Everything showed up neatly and safely packed in a very timely fashion. I ordered online Thursday night and I had it in my hands Saturday afternoon. (just after the place I can get the tank charged closed for the day...)
Here's the setup. I stashed it behind my 20 gallon betta tank in the corner and ran the tubing and the solenoid plug behind the 20g tank to reach the timer and the tank. The tubing is simply zip-tied to the cannister filter inlet and the tip stuffed into the strainer so the bubbles are sucked up and have to perculate through all the media and back out the spray bar before entering the tank. Plenty of time to dissolve. (in hindsight, the cannister needs shook or "burped" every so often. Of course I would too, if I were ingesting that much CO2.)
It works pretty well. Orlando (The guy from Greenleaf) included a bottle of bubble counter fluid and an extra bottle of Drop checker solution in the box. The magic "Bubblecounter fluid" looks suspiciously like plain old glycerin to me, but hey, I didn't need to go look for it locally, so I'm happy!
Here's one of my first bubbles! w00t!
The drop checker if a handy little dangit to have if you're not springing for the pH controller. I will eventually, but it wasn't in the cards money wise at this time. Anyhow, I'm running about a bubble every 2.5 seconds right now. More than that and the dropchecker goes bright yellow (bad)
Here are some before shots.
Being it's only been 5 days, I can't say I've seen pearling or an instantaneous growth spurt, but the plants do seem a little perkier. I would imagine I'll need to up the frequency of dosing with Flourish, but am glad to be rid of the Excel. Once I see signs of growth I can directly attribute to the CO2, I'll go plant shopping again, for some taller stuff to fill in the right side of the tank.
Be warned, the needle valve gets hot when in use!
Similar Aquarium Fish Forum Threads
to get a 125 gallon tank next fall instead. SWMBO has talked me into making the Dining room into a big Office/den, when I do that, I'll rip out the fake fireplace and build the 125 into the wall at a decent height. (the 55 is only 20" off the floor to fit under a window. Great for maintenance, but you have to sit on the floor to watch the fish.) Now my set up efforts are going to go towards my 20 high tank. But that's another thread.
