Journal 120 Dutch Ft. Yugang Reactor (Horizontal CO2 Reactor)

[Unexpected]

Hello all, my name is Mike and I just found this site by accident. I think @gjcarew told me @GreggZ had moved here but some how I failed to remember; so I'm glad I found this site today. I am a fan, as you can tell, of GreggZ. He taught me just about everything I know (through his journal on that other site) and I was also banned over a 0dKH discussion . So you know, I kind of feel close to the guy. Joking aside, I was able to go from this.
To this within a short period of time just by reading his journal.
And as time passed I was able to get this nice scape that made my wife happy.


Then I had the pleasure to meet @gjcarew over on a different site and I reached out to him with questions and such; through those conversations he motivated me to make an attempt at the 2022 AGA Dutch competition. Unfortunately, I messed the tank up right when I was about to take my photos and I couldn't recover the tank in time. Here's that tank. Obviously, there are tons of problems with it, but I was proud of it regardless. I believe it had a shot at a top 10. Not really.
I messed up the Myrio and started to get algae because I wasn't front loading properly and I didn't realize it. I believe I went too lean and thought the Landen would cover the difference.

I won't lie, I felt completely defeated and I kind of slowed down on all my tanks and didn't put my full attention into them anymore. Also, my wife and I were getting a bit burned out with so many tanks to maintain. This is where my journal begins.

I wanted a solution to reduce our work load, and I definitely wanted a bigger tank to house my livestock from the other tanks. I was also sick of lugging canister filters around the house then plugging them to realize I forgot to connect a tube. Fountains of water on our walls wasn't working out so well! I also wanted absolutely no water outside of the tank. By chance, I found the Innovative Marine SR Pro2 120 and bought it.

Now here's the cool thing that happened. I was using a 20 inch RO housing for my reactor, but the tank is only 16 inches high. Four inches of Cerge's reactor was incredibly ugly. And again, by chance, I found the solution. Enter the Yugang Horizontal reactor. I affectionally call it by his forum name because I couldn't be happier with how amazing this thing is. It's so simple, yet so brilliant. I reached out to Yugang and asked if he got the reactor to work. He replied with "my CO2 spray bar works so well I never tried it". I then asked if anyone else got it to work and he said no one has tried it. So I told him I would and apparently, I really am the first person to run this thing through some trials. I think that's pretty cool honestly! Yugang made some calculations for me and on the second build, we nailed it. I get a 1.5pH drop and the design makes it so no additianal CO2 can be added. It's seemingly impossible to gas my fish as the reactor has safety built into the design length. Amazing! I'm so glad there are so many people smarter than I am. It makes my problems so much easier to manage .

The reactor is nothing more than cheap PVC with a gentle stream of tank water flowing under a pocket of CO2. Add a cheap bypass and a method of injection and you now have a Yugang reactor. This success has energized me enough to have another go at the AGA. I bought new lights (Weak Aqua P600's), jammed as many plants I could into the tank and I'm starting my plant selection now. I have a long ways to go but I'm hoping to achieve my goal. The tank is nothing to look at right now; getting plants here in Albuquerque is quite the challenge so I'm mostly waiting on submerge growth and to get them propagated. I also have way too many species but the selection process has begun. I just need to see which ones will grow in Ace Hardware pool filter sand. So far, all seem like they are coming along fine in the sand.

Oh, here's the reactor.

And here's the really ugly tank in it's current condition.


I promise, it will look much better soon. It's been a scramble to pull everything together so quickly.

I hope some of you follow along; I know I will have tons of questions soon enough for all of you!

 

[Art]

Hey welcome! I love so many things about your first post. Thanks for taking the time!

First, please set up a Build Thread badge so people can easily find this post just.

Second, many of us are fans of Gregg and have benefited from his guidance and wisdom. Love how you have a before and after tank. Amazing progress.

Lastly, anyone who attempts a Dutch scape has my respect. It's a very difficult style to execute and absolute perfection is rarely achieved. Congrats on it. I think it looks great.

I also think most of us that have been in the hobby for a long time have experienced periods of burn out and lack of motivation. Most have also had a setback that makes one question whether to throw in the towel and get out. However, something always brings you back and lights the flame again. In your case, it seems the horizontal reactor is it. I'm glad!

On the reactor, can you explain more how it works?

 

[GreggZ]

Hey Mike good to see you here and thanks for the kind words. I am glad to hear the ramblings in my journal were helpful to you.

The tank pics above are striking. Beautiful presentations of healthy looking plants. I really like the layouts, and I think I see some Joe Harvey influence in there, which is a good thing.

The 120 already looks great and I am sure is going to get even more spectacular as you fill things in. That's a lot of real estate to manage, so I hope you enjoy the trimming/pruning process.

That reactor sure looks interesting. I was aware of it before but haven't seen anyone duplicate it. Very cool engineering.

And of course great to see some Rainbows in the tank!!

I'll be following along and looking forward to seeing how this one develops. Has potential to be really special.

 

[*Ci*]

I have been hesitant to change to reactors from my inline diffusers for a number of reasons, but the horizontal design is intriguing to me. If you ever find the time to show your build on that unit, it would be much appreciated.
Thanks for staring your journal! I love following these stories : )

 

[Unexpected]

I'm waiting for his permission to steal his nice diagrams and I should be able to get them posted tonight. Here was my first build. It was 2 inch diameter pipe with a pretty hefty pump. It was a bit noisy, would only drop pH by .7 and didn't have a bypass. Apparently, the amount of flow isn't important and does little to increase CO2. I guess what matters is the interface surface area and you just want a gentle flow through the pipe. The pipe needs to be roughly the length of the tank with the appropriate diameter. In my case, my option for length was limited hence the .7 drop. My second build uses 2 pipes connected with some spare tubing and a less powerful pump. Once the first pipe reaches maximum CO2 capacity, the pipe purges CO2 into the second pipe where dessolution is completed. The second pipe will reach capacity right at the 1.5 drop. Any purge from this pipe is released into the back chamber and the atmosphere. So it goes: dedicated pump to a T connector. One direction is the bypass and the other to an inline diffuser without the ceramic installed, then on into the first pipe. The exit from the second pipe and bypass just spill into my back chamber where the tank pumps push it to the display.
Maybe you can see with these already installed pictures.

 

[Unexpected]

I received permission from Yugang and here's his diagrams.


******Link****** to the reactor discussion

Horizontal CO2 reactor - Estimations for a big tank, or small tank

For Info from Moderation Team: UKAPS is not against innovation in the hobby or new approaches and ideas on how to do things, CO2 is one that most struggle with and any new idea is viable if presented in the right manner, this thread will be closed and remain here, unless the original member...

www.ukaps.org

 

[Burr740]

Those last couple renditions of the old one had a lot of ingredients of a top Dutch tank. A six footer is no harder (or easier) just have more species to use in the same manner

 

[Unexpected]

Those last couple renditions of the old one had a lot of ingredients of a top Dutch tank. A six footer is no harder (or easier) just have more species to use in the same manner

I struggle with creating depth in these narrow tanks, add in how new I am to Dutch and scaping in general, I tend to create plant walls. I will try to focus on midground this go around.

And thank you for the positive reply. This let's me know I'm headed in a good direction.

 

[Burr740]

I struggle with creating depth

Dont we all! lol Creating depth is one of the biggest challenges of making a good Dutch scape, also one of the primary things a good one has. Focus on dramatic contrasts in height (and big full groups) Everywhere should have height contrasts but esp around the street. You want the plants on either side of the street to be a lot taller than the street plants. Not necessarily at the very front where you may have a really short foreground plant, but soon as it hits the midground and back make sure everything beside it is taller.

 

[Unexpected]

Big reduction yesterday and some organizational changes. Followed by a 90% water change and filter cleaning. I definitely made the same mistakes as always and placed plants such that contrast is meh. At least there's more room for them to breath. I was able to get down to 23 species. Just 5 more to go.

The wood on the left may have to go. The Fissidens has algae and with the fern being such a slow grower....The Echinodorus Parviflorus remains lunch for the snails but the dumpster fire shipment of Helferi is making improvements. How does one package this for shipping and say, yup...looks great?
The myriohyllum is recovering, same with the Spatulata and the Ovalis. Rubin is a new plant for me and new growth is twisting. I'm not sure what's happening there.

For now I've bumped nutrients to the upper end of EI and hope to put on mass quickly.

 

[Art]

Wow, those plants definitely don't look well.

 

[Unexpected]

Wow, those plants definitely don't look well.

Yeah, the struggle getting plants here in Albuquerque can be frustrating.

 

[Art]

I think the struggle is real in most places in the US. Unless you live near one of the few places that stocks (properly) plants, it is a challenge getting plants.

 

[Unexpected]

Can anyone tell me who the culprit is? Potential suspects are, pond snails (have had them always and they have never done this before this new tank), Clown Plecos, SAE or Oto's.

I've introduced new plants recently, maybe I picked up a terrible specie's of pond snail?

This seemingly happened over night. But I work a lot.

 

[Freshflora]

Can anyone tell me who the culprit is? Potential suspects are, pond snails (have had them always and they have never done this before this new tank), Clown Plecos, SAE or Oto's.

I've introduced new plants recently, maybe I picked up a terrible specie's of pond snail?

This seemingly happened over night. But I work a lot.

My guess is either the pleco or the SAEs. Could be the snails though also, not totally sure. What’s your feeding schedule like? Often this can be a sign of under-feeding, sometimes even specifically under-feeding vegetable matter. For example, my cherry barbs started to eat my macrandra and bacopa sg when I was only feeding a couple times a week. As soon as I increased feeding, including making sure they were getting enough veggy matter, it completely stopped.

 

[Unexpected]

My guess is either the pleco or the SAEs. Could be the snails though also, not totally sure. What’s your feeding schedule like? Often this can be a sign of under-feeding, sometimes even specifically under-feeding vegetable matter. For example, my cherry barbs started to eat my macrandra and bacopa sg when I was only feeding a couple times a week. As soon as I increased feeding, including making sure they were getting enough veggy matter, it completely stopped.

I feed pellets and frozen food twice a day and wafers once a day.

 

[Burr740]

Pleco or SAE, both can do that. Typical pond snails arent equipped to damage a healthy leaf.

 

[BigWave]

How big are the SAE's? Ive found once they reach adulthood they shy away from eating anything other than plants. Ive got a love hate relationship with them. They have so much personality but once grown will decimate a planted tank. Each one has its own trates and beheiviors. Be warned.

 

[Unexpected]

How big are the SAE's? Ive found once they reach adulthood they shy away from eating anything other than plants. Ive got a love hate relationship with them. They have so much personality but once grown will decimate a planted tank. Each one has its own trates and beheiviors. Be warned.

About 4 inches now. I'll see how it goes without the Plecos and re-home the SAE if it's him.

 

[Mr.Shenanagins]

My SAE enjoyed any soft leaf green plants, I could not keep moss or hydrocotyle trip without them decimating it in a very short period of time. Great fish and cool personality, but they are happy to munch on your scape if it suits them.