Poor Man's Nutrients Control - Donovan's Nitrate Destroyer

[Neil Cohen]

Update on my DND: boy do I suck at plumbing. Don't know how but every fitting leaks. Finished 3 days of seeding bacteria. Going to drain it and fix the fittings before hooking it up and dosing carbon. Finger's crossed.

 

[fftfk]

Seeding the DND(RIP Donavan).small dosing pump circulating Dr. Tim’s can’t wait to get it in-line tok a while to get all the parts and then plug the leaks

Good luck. I just finished reading the whole thread and believe I read in a post somewhere in the middle that Dr. Tim's did not work. The person had to switch to MB7 to get the DND working.

 

[Neil Cohen]

Well, all of my Dr. Tims wound up on the floor due to a bad seal on one of the fittings. After all kinds of gluing and other attempts, I cut it apart and rebuilt it with elbows instead of a connecting pipe. Need to get more bacteria, so maybe I’ll try the MB7

 

[fftfk]

Well, all of my Dr. Tims wound up on the floor due to a bad seal on one of the fittings. After all kinds of gluing and other attempts, I cut it apart and rebuilt it with elbows instead of a connecting pipe. Need to get more bacteria, so maybe I’ll try the MB7

That seems to be the one most people report success with

 

[Tarius]

Hi all,

FYI FOWLR only. 11 fish mostly triggerfish ranging from 2-6in, heavy feeding 3 times per day...i have 2- 4x30in pvc tubes with Donavon's suggested media adding seachem matrix and sulfur pellets..i wanted to give my input on my status so far..I started the DND a YEAR ago last week. No water changes since i started besides topping off. I started with nitrates off the charts on the API test 160+. The first 3-4 months i was back and forth fighting zero nitrates out the DND to sometimes again off the charts over 160 (both DND & DT) with dosing vodka. During the 4th month i started seeing a steady dialed in decrease of nitrates. The 5th month i stopped dosing carbon because i would get that rotten egg smell and haven't touch or dosed the DND in 7 months to today with no water changes either and both the DT and DND read zero nitrates since then (not sure if this is bad yet with zero nitrates in FOWLR? This is with API test). All parameters are at zero. Which As i type this i realize i forgot the Ph as have to check.

 

[Neil Cohen]

Any suggestions on a pump? I was using an old dosing pump but it failed. Guessing bc it wasn’t made for 24/7 pumping.

 

[Neil Cohen]

Finally working!!! Output line was giving me some trouble and I thought it was the pump. I think it wound up being a combination of placement of the pump and patience. I was away for 2 days and came back to find the output tube a little slimy. Nitrate test showed a significantly lighter color than the DT.

Seeded and dosed bacter7, 10ml/day for 3 days, added diy nopox dosing after 3 days, 4ml/day.

 

[Neil Cohen]

Added the DND three weeks ago. Wasn’t seeing much improvement. A few days ago I tighten all the fittings(including the guest fittings) and the stream improved.

Testing today, four days later, and my nitrates went from over 75 on the Hanna (flashing 75) to 39. I was planning a 50% WC because of this but now I am going to leave it.

I also added a DIY turf scrubber and a brightwell export plate soaked in MB7

 

[Neil Cohen]

Well, once it gets going, it is a monster. Took a bit of time to work out the kinks, so between last week and today nitrates dropped from over 100 to 9.5. Phosphates bottomed out too. Going to feed heavy and dose phosphates when they arrive from Amazon. Tank is a little unhappy.

 

[Neil Cohen]

Update: had some air bubbling in the line, then a blockage which caused water to exit the John guest fitting. And, due to the ATO trying to compensate, dropped my salinity. So replumbed the fittings. Put on new caps and screwed them in tightly(didn’t realize that they should be recessed when fully tightened. Also got a tap set and made clean threads to put in the hose connections. Used plenty of pipe tape this time and the output is steady and hasn’t had an issue with leaking or flow.

Nitrates dropped from over 100 to 9.5 to 4.6. Tank was not happy. After a few days of heavy feeding and getting the salt back to 1.026, everyone is back to normal. GSP was closed for 4 days. I’ve had GSP survive being outside of water for a week but it surely doesn’t enjoy a rapid drop in nitrates.

I had cut the dt nopox in half and the nitrates went to 10, with all the frozen, reefroids, etc. going to start dosing phos soon as all of the stuff that cut nitrates seems to have made phosphate disappear.

in addition to the DND, I have a turf scrubber that is growing, a big export plate and the protein skimmer.

side note, I have never had such stinky, nasty sludge in the skimmer as I do now. Almost enough to make you vomit. Better out of the tank than in.

 

[wmb0003]

Update: had some air bubbling in the line, then a blockage which caused water to exit the John guest fitting. And, due to the ATO trying to compensate, dropped my salinity. So replumbed the fittings. Put on new caps and screwed them in tightly(didn’t realize that they should be recessed when fully tightened. Also got a tap set and made clean threads to put in the hose connections. Used plenty of pipe tape this time and the output is steady and hasn’t had an issue with leaking or flow.

Nitrates dropped from over 100 to 9.5 to 4.6. Tank was not happy. After a few days of heavy feeding and getting the salt back to 1.026, everyone is back to normal. GSP was closed for 4 days. I’ve had GSP survive being outside of water for a week but it surely doesn’t enjoy a rapid drop in nitrates.

I had cut the dt nopox in half and the nitrates went to 10, with all the frozen, reefroids, etc. going to start dosing phos soon as all of the stuff that cut nitrates seems to have made phosphate disappear.

in addition to the DND, I have a turf scrubber that is growing, a big export plate and the protein skimmer.

side note, I have never had such stinky, nasty sludge in the skimmer as I do now. Almost enough to make you vomit. Better out of the tank than in.

Are you still dosing 4ml/day of the DIY nopox? Also what size was your tank?

 

[Sean Clark]

Update: had some air bubbling in the line, then a blockage which caused water to exit the John guest fitting. And, due to the ATO trying to compensate, dropped my salinity. So replumbed the fittings. Put on new caps and screwed them in tightly(didn’t realize that they should be recessed when fully tightened. Also got a tap set and made clean threads to put in the hose connections. Used plenty of pipe tape this time and the output is steady and hasn’t had an issue with leaking or flow.

Nitrates dropped from over 100 to 9.5 to 4.6. Tank was not happy. After a few days of heavy feeding and getting the salt back to 1.026, everyone is back to normal. GSP was closed for 4 days. I’ve had GSP survive being outside of water for a week but it surely doesn’t enjoy a rapid drop in nitrates.

I had cut the dt nopox in half and the nitrates went to 10, with all the frozen, reefroids, etc. going to start dosing phos soon as all of the stuff that cut nitrates seems to have made phosphate disappear.

in addition to the DND, I have a turf scrubber that is growing, a big export plate and the protein skimmer.

side note, I have never had such stinky, nasty sludge in the skimmer as I do now. Almost enough to make you vomit. Better out of the tank than in.

Off topic, but this is brilliant! So simple.

 

[Neil Cohen]

Tank is 100g with a sump. Dosing 4ml of randy's recipe Nopox into the DND and 25 into the DT. Will taper to 0 in the display, just trying to slow down the drop. I was under the impression that dropping to 4ppm would make everything happy but, like everything else in this hobby, slow and steady wins the race.

 

[Neil Cohen]

Off topic, but this is brilliant! So simple.

 

[Neil Cohen]

Thanks. I was playing around with a DIY turf scrubber and it never worked how I wanted. got this light and had originally placed it facing down but it really only grew algae on the top. This was a random attempt and it worked well. I also use those hooks to hold my autolifter pump to the DND. Trying to imporve my undercabinet design but I am a mess

 

[Kirkfrey]

I have mine built (4" PVC x 3' tall) and am thinking about how to feed it. My calcium reactor has about the right amount of flow and I was wondering if I used my calcium reactor feed pump to take water from my tank, push it thru the DND, then into the calcium reactor and back to my tank. I dont know if this is a good/bad/or never been tried idea but it avoids me having to buy another feed pump or change some other part of my plumbing.

 

[Neil Cohen]

I use an aqua lifter because I had one. Original plan was to build a manifold off the incoming water. But this seems to work. I am sure you could feed off your calcium reactor, put a t online with a backflow preventor on your dosing line. Just make sure you have tight fittings, it can clog and you don’t want a pump draining your tank.

 

[Neil Cohen]

Update: DND has been running a while but I use 5/26 as my start date due to technical issues. That was the day that it first dropped my nitrates. I was over 100 and now it is .4 ppm via Hanna.

prob would have gotten there faster but the first major drop made for some very unhappy coral.

been running the DND, turf scrubber (finally growing thick algae), skim tons of gunk and have an export plate. Had been carbon dosing the dt but been cutting it by half every week. Going to cut by half and test again tomorrow. Aiming for 10 ppm no3, stability is primary, though, so it has to match feeding heavy pellets and frozen

goal is to turn the sump into a frag grow out, now that I don’t need as much rock in it. Sick area is the ats, export plate is in return pump section. But I wanted everything running as stable as possible first.

 

[Neil Cohen]

Update: ten days of stability. Stopped dosing nopox to the DT, just 4ml per day into the DND. NO3 steady at 7.5 and Phos is .47

note: turf scrubber and export plate in sump. Not a ton of algae but decent clumps. Skim mate is down too. Was producing tons of gunk.

most importantly, corals are looking happy.

 

[Steve2020]

Curious on how the DND has been working for everyone? I am in the process of slowly reducing my DIY carbon source to zero due to the AcroPower along with Carbon dosing has caused a small ( so far ) Dino outbreak. I ran across this yesterday and I am very interested on building one and giving it a try. I do have a lot of questions about the build but will hold of on those once I hear some feedback on how things a going with everyone's DND.
Thank you.