Red Sea NO3:POX4X Real Time Review.

Randy Holmes-Farley · Feb 18, 2016

cvicente said:
Randy you are talking about potassium or phosphate ?

Both.

Potassium is primarily held inside of cells, and is not attached strongly to the organism tissues.

So if freezing breaks open cell membranes, the potassium will spill out, and if you rinse the foods, it will be lost.

Phosphate, on the other hand, is primarily part of organic molecules and tissues, and is not so readily lost (as inorganic phosphate), but can be lost as whole biomolecules such as DNA, proteins, etc. that may be spilled out of broken cells.

omar jawad · Feb 18, 2016

Randy Holmes-Farley said:
Does the NOPOX bottle itself seem to settle like that if you leave it sitting for a while?

Hard to say. I did confirm via phone to RedSea that it needs to be shaken. I have an un-opened bottle. I will check and see what it looks like in side but I'm not sure how well I will be able to tell with the bottle not being clear. I could try to pour it out slowly and see if that shows the signs.

Randy Holmes-Farley · Feb 18, 2016

Red Sea claims the following, in addition to the organic carbon:

"The Red Sea NO3: PO4-X complex includes other organic-bonded elements that are important stimulators in each stage of the reduction process. These metal and non-metals elements ensure steady bacterial propagation, complete nitrate reduction to nitrogen gas as well as the absorption and utilization of phosphate by the bacteria."

I do not know what those other materials might be, but some or all of them might be what is settling.

jason2459 · Feb 18, 2016

I believe it's also somewhat diluted which wouldn't help either.

Kungpaoshizi · Feb 19, 2016

Best advice I can suggest for anyone wondering, buy the smallest bottles of nopox, and RE A&B, and hook them up to dosers. You can get away with a weeks amount of RE not being in the fridge. Dose half the suggested doses, and don't feed anything else to the tank.

Unless you don't have dosers, you're out 20-30$ if you decide it's not for you? Otherwise it's the easiest automated system I've ever used. No matter the automatic feeder(tried them all!), pellets, nutricell, etc, never worked out very well and lead to major algae after time and the imbalance of nitrate vs po4.

Having to touch my tank once a week is great bliss. That's aside from the growth and management of everything. I can actually enjoy stuff instead of it becoming more of a daily chore than anything else. IMO, not being able to spend more than a couple days away from the tank if work or life calls for it, and being chained to it, is not what I'm looking for.

Kungpaoshizi · Feb 19, 2016

To the OP.
More tidbits about possible tangents, as methanol is a natural product.

Methanol is produced naturally in the anaerobic metabolism of many varieties of bacteria, and is commonly present in small amounts in the environment.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Methanol
In the troposphere, methanol (CH3OH) is present ubiquitously and second in abundance among organic gases after methane. In the surface ocean, methanol represents a supply of energy and carbon for marine microbes. Here we report direct measurements of air-sea methanol transfer along a ∼10,000-km north-south transect of the Atlantic. The flux of methanol was consistently from the atmosphere to the ocean. Constrained by the aerodynamic limit and measured rate of air-sea sensible heat exchange, methanol transfer resembles a one-way depositional process, which suggests dissolved methanol concentrations near the water surface that are lower than what were measured at ∼5 m depth, for reasons currently unknown. We estimate the global oceanic uptake of methanol and examine the lifetimes of this compound in the lower atmosphere and upper ocean with respect to gas exchange. We also constrain the molecular diffusional resistance above the ocean surface-an important term for improving air-sea gas exchange models.
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/24277830
[1] An anticorrelation between atmospheric methanol (CH3OH) concentrations and wind speed and a positive correlation between dimethylsulphide (DMS) concentrations and wind speed have been observed at the coastal air monitoring site of Mace Head in Ireland, during a period of cyclonic activity in which the averaged surface wind speed changed substantially as a low-pressure system evolved over the northeast Atlantic. These observations suggest a net air-to-sea flux of CH3OH.
http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/1...4GB002294/full
[1] Oceanic methanol, acetaldehyde, and acetone concentrations were measured during an Atlantic Meridional Transect (AMT) cruise from the UK to Chile (49°N to 39°S) in 2009. Methanol (48–361 nM) and acetone (2–24 nM) varied over the track with enrichment in the oligotrophic Northern Atlantic Gyre. Acetaldehyde showed less variability (3–9 nM) over the full extent of the transect. These oxygenated volatile organic compounds (OVOCs) were also measured subsurface, with methanol and acetaldehyde mostly showing homogeneity throughout the water column. Acetone displayed a reduction below the mixed layer. OVOC concentrations did not consistently correlate with primary production or chlorophyll-a levels in the surface Atlantic Ocean. However, we did find a novel and significant negative relationship between acetone concentration and bacterial leucine incorporation, suggesting that acetone might be removed by marine bacteria as a source of carbon. Microbial turnover of both acetone and acetaldehyde was confirmed. Modeled atmospheric data are used to estimate the likely air-side OVOC concentrations. The direction and magnitude of air-sea fluxes vary for all three OVOCs depending on location. We present evidence that the ocean may exhibit regions of acetaldehyde under-saturation. Extrapolation suggests that the Atlantic Ocean represents an overall source of these OVOCs to the atmosphere at 3, 3, and 1 Tg yr−1 for methanol, acetaldehyde, and acetone, respectively.
http://eprints.whiterose.ac.uk/80072/
In the surface ocean, methanol is rapidly consumed by marine microbes as a source of carbon and energy. There are many sources of methanol in the atmosphere, including emissions from trees and gases, fossil fuel combustion and industrial fuel use. Methanol is the second most abundant organic gas in the atmosphere and affects the atmospheric chemistry. It is also indirectly linked to climate because the abundance of methanol affects the concentration of the hydroxyl radical – a natural ‘cleansing agent’ of the atmosphere that removes many pollutants in the air (including the major greenhouse gas methane).

Transport of gases between the ocean and the atmosphere, known as ‘air-sea gas exchange’, has profound implications for our environment and the Earth’s climate. The main goal of this study was to understand of how much, and in which direction, methanol is being transferred between the atmosphere and the ocean. The study also utilised methanol as a ‘proxy gas’ with which to study the general physical processes involved in air-sea gas exchange. The rate of transfer of soluble organic compounds like methanol is currently poorly understood, largely due to a scarcity of open-ocean measurements.

The research estimated the global oceanic uptake of methanol and examined the lifespan of this compound in the lower atmosphere and the upper-ocean with respect to gas exchange. It also quantified the rate of methanol deposition and examined the governing processes near the air-sea interface. The study improves our overall understanding of the roles organic compounds play in the atmosphere as well as ocean.
http://www.ocean-partners.org/first-...hanol-exchange

potatocouch · Feb 20, 2016

Has anyone combine NoPox dosing and adding media such as Sera Siporax Professional?

The idea is to add housing for those additional anaerobic bacteria as a result of carbon dosing.

justjes45 · Feb 20, 2016

Ummm....
So this thread went from being useful, to a bit overwhelming. I'm not a super scientist I just want to balance my tank.

I have read through the entire thread here because I was thinking about using the Red Sea program. Now I am thinking about using the vinegar vodka program.

I have not found yet anywhere if this says white vinegar over apple cider vinegar. And as far as vodka goes, what percentage is the best?
I have a 30 gallon Nuvo tank. I am planning on manually dosing as I don't yet understand a dosing machine…
Thanks!

Randy Holmes-Farley · Feb 20, 2016

potatocouch said:
Has anyone combine NoPox dosing and adding media such as Sera Siporax Professional?

The idea is to add housing for those additional anaerobic bacteria as a result of carbon dosing.

I think it is a fine idea, but will probably skew the nutrient reduction even more to nitrate removal relative to phosphate since it will likely increase denitrification relative to simple aerobic bacterial growth and consumption of nutrients for tissue mass.

Randy Holmes-Farley · Feb 20, 2016

justjes45 said:
I have not found yet anywhere if this says white vinegar over apple cider vinegar. And as far as vodka goes, what percentage is the best?
I have a 30 gallon Nuvo tank. I am planning on manually dosing as I don't yet understand a dosing machine…
Thanks!

The concentration of the vodka is unimportant. You just dose more or less of it. Most "recipes" assume it is 40% ethanol, or 80 proof.

Most people (such as myself) who use vinegar dose distilled white vinegar because it is cheaper and purer than other types of vinegar, but I've not heard of any problem from folks using other types (but the numbers of them are low).

pingzing47 · Feb 24, 2016

Been using nopox for over 2 months and have nitrate of .25 and phosphate .04 to .08. Rocks have cleared up from some green and brown algae. Corals both sps and lps looking good. Very happy. Just takes time. Also skim aggressively and suspect I had lot of nutrients tied up in live rock.

biom · Mar 5, 2016

Just to share my experience with DIY Nopox - i.e. etahnol 17% +acetic acid 3%, both analytical grade, no other stuff in it (methanol or isopropanol). My system is 78 gal SPS dominated, after more than 7 months of using DIY Nopox parameters are as follows: NO3 - 0.2ppm (salifert), PO4- 0.012 (lab spectrophotometer), no phosphate remover used, 10% weekly wc Red Sea regular salt. Feeding 3 times per day, 12 grams of frozen food in total. Maintenance daily DIY Nopox dose 3 ml (1 ml per 100 l water). So despite the lack of methanol and isopropanol in it, it works more than perfect in therms of phosphate and nitrate reduction, coral colors are also very good. The only issue I had is cyano, it was there before to start with diy nopox, but did not disappear.
From today I switched to acetic acid, made a solution that have same amount of carbon as nopox, and started with same maintenance dose, I'm really curious what will be the difference. I'll not change anything else. Will keep you informed.

jason2459 · Mar 5, 2016

Well, I went from dosing straight acetic acid to dosing a 690/310 ratio of vinegar/vodka. Not exactly the ratio known to be in NoPox but based on another member's experience (TMZ). I liked that it was more vinegar in the ratio.

I've used straight vinegar for many years. NO3 well under 5 via API and under 2 via Salifert. PO4 would vary between .02-.09. No GFO used. Algae harvesting in place along with a skimmer and ~1% daily automatic water changes.

I'd have to look back in my log but I would say the past 2 months now I've switched over to the VV mix. And other exports still in place. Still no GFO.

Visually I noticed rocks and sand were "whiter" with in the first week.

As for parameters my nitrates have gone undetectable.

My PO4 has staid under .03. Also validated by Triton a couple times.

Edit:

I guess to add this is in my 180g. Fairly heavily stocked and fed I would say.

Feed
automatically 4 times a day NLS pellet mix of Marine and AlgaeMax
1-2 sheets nori
3-4 cubes of meaty stuff.

biom · Mar 5, 2016

Thank you jason, what was maintenance dose then and now? You have ATS wright? Did you notice color change in SPS corals?

jason2459 · Mar 5, 2016

biom said:
Thank you jason, what was maintenance dose then and now? You have ATS wright? Did you notice color change in SPS corals?

Sps has had a rough time in my tank. Early last year they all died due to mold and mildew remover being sprayed all over the basement walls next to my sump room.

Last month I was away for close to a week and Murphy took over maintenance and my alk spiked to 14 dKH and SPS bleached. Except my purple haze monti. It's been very colorful the entire time. Faded a bit during the Alk spike but has recovered very well.

I was dosing around 100ml/day of the vinegar through out the day light hours.

Now I'm dosing around 36ml/day of the VV. I was doing it during just day light hours but the past couple weeks I switch it to run every 4 hours 24/7. It's actually stabilized my pH even more.

I separated my ATO from my lime water dosing late last year. So my still water reservoir doses limewater for 1 second every 5 minutes 24/7. The effect this had was pH stability (and I assume alk as well) and allowed me to remove my CO2 scrubber that was keeping my pH over 7.9 during the over night hours.

Yes, I run a Turbo L3 ATS and runs 18 hours a day with it off peak day time.

Randy Holmes-Farley · Mar 5, 2016

biom said:
Just to share my experience with DIY Nopox - i.e. etahnol 17% +acetic acid 3%, both analytical grade, no other stuff in it (methanol or isopropanol). My system is 78 gal SPS dominated, after more than 7 months of using DIY Nopox parameters are as follows: NO3 - 0.2ppm (salifert), PO4- 0.012 (lab spectrophotometer), no phosphate remover used, 10% weekly wc Red Sea regular salt. Feeding 3 times per day, 12 grams of frozen food in total. Maintenance daily DIY Nopox dose 3 ml (1 ml per 100 l water). So despite the lack of methanol and isopropanol in it, it works more than perfect in therms of phosphate and nitrate reduction, coral colors are also very good. The only issue I had is cyano, it was there before to start with diy nopox, but did not disappear.
From today I switched to acetic acid, made a solution that have same amount of carbon as nopox, and started with same maintenance dose, I'm really curious what will be the difference. I'll not change anything else. Will keep you informed.

Very nice update and I am looking forward to the change results!

biom · Mar 5, 2016

36 ml in 180 gal, sounds a little bit too much to me, that is more than 5 ml per 100 liters of tank water (Red Sea recommends 1-3 ml/100l IIRC)

jason2459 · Mar 5, 2016

biom said:
36 ml in 180 gal, sounds a little bit too much to me, that is more than 5 ml per 100 liters of tank water (Red Sea recommends 1-3 ml/100l IIRC)

Keep in mind I'm using TMZ's ratio of 690ml vinegar to 310ml vodka.

NoPOx has a ratio of 590ml vinegar to 410ml vodka.

Around 200g total water volume.

biom · Mar 5, 2016

36 ml of Tom 's recipe correspond to 30 ml of nopox in therms of organic carbon and if water volume is 200g this means about 4ml nopox equivalents per 100l water. Of course this is your thank and you know situation better, just wanted to raise your attention since I'm using only 1 ml per 100l in small tank with high bioload and no additional NP export methods (you have an ATS in addition).

jason2459 · Mar 5, 2016

Here's what I logged in my tank journal on where I got to the dosing amount

I made a change yesterday to my carbon dosing. Something I haven't done in years. I've been dosing ~100 ml of Vinegar every day through out the day time hours for I don't know how long. Just swap out an empty jug of vinegar with another cheap store brand white vinegar and don't even think about it. 
 
I've been following this thread for quite some time 
--Edited out link--

and TMZ's thread on carbon dosing 
--edited out link--
 
Bacteria has always been an interest of mine in our aquariums since starting with "bio" pellets as they were just starting to come out 
--edited out link--
 
Well, I was at Walgreens the other day and came across some Barton Vodka which TMZ has recommended and what he uses. Distilled and Charcoal filtered. 
 

 
 
It was just over $10 for a 1.75 L bottle. I said What The ... Heck. I calculated out and set my 1.1ml/m BRS doser to reduce the amount of vinegar added and bolus dosed some of the Vodka. Based off what TMZ doses for his system I get for my ~200g system volume: 
~24.9ml Vinegar 
~10.79ml Vodka 
 
I did that yesterday but then thought about how I have no idea exactly how much that 1.1ml/m BRS doser is dosing. So, I could figure out how much that BRS 1.1ml/m doser actually doses, bolus dose both, or just mix it all together and just dose it all together. Which is much more up my alley as I do not like dosing on a daily basis anything or feeling pressure to have to dose something manually daily. I'm much more about automation. 
 
SO, using "TMZ's recipe" I mixed the two together in a 690ml to 310ml ratio and mixed up the entire 1.75L bottle of Barton Vodka with vinegar. I have my doser set to dose ~35.69ml per day. Now if it's off it's off but in the right ratio.

And ran it by TMZ for validation.

His reply

tmz;24220652 said:
Been offline for a few days.

11 ml 80 proof vodka and 25ml 5% vinegar are the same amounts per gallon of water volume I use . The optimal amount will likely vary some from tank to tank.

FWIW, I bolus dose 30ml of vodka an 80ml of vinegar to the 650 gallon system in the am. The pH drop from the vinegar is relatively small( - .1 ) and brief 15 minutes or less at that relatively small amount(.12 ml per gallon) . If I used more vinegar I'd spread it out.

I also dose 6 ml vodka in the pm . The heterotrophic bacteria are thought to split every twelve hours or so. The pm dose is a shot at sustaining actiivity .

And if working based on what I was dosing before.

~100ml/day @ 5% = 5

Now
~36ml/day
@69% vinegar @5% = 1.242
@31% vodka @ 40% = 4.464
= 5.706

So I'm dosing slightly more carbon then I was before. Biggest difference though is the extra type of bacteria needed to break down the ethanol to acetic acid.

If it ultimately maters though I have no idea. I do know I've tried bumping up my vinegar dosing in the past and I always backed back down to ~100ml/day not because of any parameters but because of excess white bacteria growth.