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Calcium Reactors (CR) are an essential component to SPS systems and helpful
in soft corals systems. There are several important components to consider CO2
CYLINDERS 
These are the containers that look like a scuba diving tank. You can purchase
one from a local airgas supplier that provides CO2 to the restaurant industry.
The CO2 that you use to dissolve your aragonite in your CR is the same gas that
they use to give the fizz to your soft drink (aka sugar water) . You will need
to get this refilled periodically, as the gas is used up. However if you have
a leak, you can use up the cylinder very quickly. That's why we recommend that
you make a solution of water and liquid soap and apply this all fittings on the
CR assembly. If there is a gas leak, it will form a bubble, and you can pinpoint
the leak and fix it.
AIRLINE Make sure that the airline you use for
the CO2 is made for it. Otherwise, the gas can leak out of regular airline tubing.
FLOW METERS The biggest challenge we have found in CR Accessories
is getting a flowmeter to accurately control the flow of the CO2 (carbon dioxide)
from the CO2 tank to the calcium reactor. It is quite difficult to maintain
a very slow flowrate in most meters, as even at their smallest setting, they allow
too much CO2 throught. Once you find a meter in the proper range, adjusting
its needle valve properly is difficult and often times they clog up the stuff
and quit working. Sometimes they will allow too much CO2 into the system, which
can also be a disaster if left unattended for long. So we are not happy
with any of them yet. We are still in process of looking for great CO2 valve and
maybe someone will contact us and recommend an excellent one, which we will then
post here. AUTOMATIC CUTOFF VALVE Usually when you buy a package for
a CO2 system, it will come with an AUTOMATIC CUTOFF VALVE. The purpose of this
valve is to cut off the flow of CO2 to reactor to your reactor when the power
goes out. This is necessary because CO2 is pressure fed without using electricity
at all, but the rest of the CR uses electricity to function. So if the power goes
out, the CO2 is still flowing to your CR and then to your aquarium. Not good.
This can rapidly lower your pH in the aquarium causing all sorts of problems. The
cutoff valve will cut off the flow of CO2 to the aquarium when the power goes
out. So be sure to get one for your CR When you choose a CR, make sure that
it is easy to clean! We bought some in the early years from a German supplier
and even though they work okay, the maintenance on them is an incredible chore.
If we want to "punish" one of our workings, the running joke is they
have to clean one of the calcium reactors! We had to fabricate special tools
to reach down to the bottom and to clean out the two lines inside the reactor
which clog up all of the time. So it is a huge headache to maintain these and
I silently curse the manufacturer each time I have to clean one. We have too many
of them to replace them all, but as new systems come online, we are careful to
choose CR models that will be easy to clean and maintain. So you should too! To
make sure that the model you are buying is easy to maintain, and the best way
to find out which make and model works really well, you should checkout a bulletin
board like ReefCentral.com
where people talk about different types of equipment.
I think it's the it's important get unbiased opinions from people NOT trying to
sell you their product. Plus we use primarily commercial equipment anyway,
so we cannot really recommend specific equipment for hobbyists. | 