Nitrate Reactor?

[jimsflies]

I always seem to have nitrates around 40 ppm in my current tank (29 gallon biocube). After a lot of research into possible skimmers, I don't think a real good one exists for small tanks (<50 gallons). After giving it some thought, I'm wondering if a denitrifying reactor might fix the issue? I'd continue to run phoshpate media in a back chamber and do a couple water changes a month.

A reactor like Bashsea's No-Trate denitrator, could easily be plumbed into the return pump and put under the tank. (I may have to figure out if the pump can handle that much head loss as I'm sure there is a lot of friction loss going through the tubing and media. Elevation head loss would be negligible since I would run it as a closed loop in the back chamber.)

Anyone using the Bashsea or other denitrifyers? How did it work? How long did it take to get the nitrates down?

[CalmSeasQuest]

Have you considered either bacteria (w or w/o carbon dosing) or Bio Pellets? I've not tried the pellets, but many seem to be having great success in lowering Nitrates.

I've had great success with the Tunze skimmers. I'm Running a 9011 in a ~50gal system. The 9002 I just put in the Desktop Nano is rated for 52 gallons and will fit into your BC29 by using an InTank custom collection cup.

[jimsflies]

Well...I looked into the skimmers and have had enough bad experiece with small skimmers I wasn't sure I wanted to bother trying anymore. I looked hard at the tunze nano skimmer...had some mixed feedback on it...but the other issue is the intank collection cup doesn't work with the HQI model biocube.

It's my understanding that the bio pellets still would require skimming?

[CalmSeasQuest]

I forgot about the HQI Yup, you're right about both. Sorry.

[jimsflies]

No problem... your post had me hoping I had missed something in my research.

[iyachtuxivm]

Jim
I got one of these when I was having on going nitrate issues in my 32g reef. Took 3 weeks to go from 35pp to about 5ppm. I have it hooked up to my current reef but I am a slacker and havent been feeding it.
http://www.aquaripure.com
They work!