This happens on mine too, but very rarley. Usually after a water cahnge, so
it may have to do with water chemistry as you say.


"David Wee" wrote in message
...
In article ,
Eric Schreiber wrote:
(David Wee) wrote:

Seems like more effort that you need, but if it's working for you, run
with it.

Bah, the mixture is working great, i got bubbling within 15 minutes but
the problem is with the much-lauded NutraFin (Hagen) "3-dimensional"
diffuser.

The diffuser starts by bubbling the Co2 at the bottom of a grid where the
bubble then travels back and forth, upwards at a gentle angle, where it is
designed to get smaller and smaller (showing that its diffusing) as it
keeps going upwards a series of inverted ramps. Problem is, the bubbles
sometimes lose their "momentum" and just stop at a random place along its
upward path on the series of ramps. This causes a "bubble" traffic
congestion, and multiple bubbles start coalescing into one gigantic bubble
that sits there for often 3 minutes or more. Eventually after more and
more nudges from new bubbles that are getting blocked, the big giant
bubble finally moves again, but its so massive, the bubble goes up those
ramps in a split second, leaving very little time for diffusion.

Now, this could be the result of some strange water chemistry between
adhesion between pockets of air /water/the plastic material that makes up
the diffuser, or simply due to the fact that the gentle upward angles are
not steep enough.

Sigh.

Either I need to start greasing the ramps with a little bit of cooking
oil, or I think I need a new diffuser. Suggestions? (i'm half serious
about greasing the diffuser).



I add a teaspoon of yeast (probably more than I need), put a cap on
it, and shake vigorously. The sugar dissolves in the warm water pretty
quickly, and I'm ready to go. I remove the cap, and attach the bottle
to my CO2 line into the tank.

The only real problem I have with my CO2 system is that I've got two
bottles, so I can rotate a fresh one on each week. Every flipping time
I mess with the bottles, one of them falls over. Without fail. Even
when I'm being very careful. This, of course, gets smelly yeasty
sticky sugary water into the CO2 line, and gums up the works, blocks
the flow, and generally annoys me.


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www.ericschreiber.com


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