Wet/Dry & Co2

[dwall174]

I'm currently working on building a custom stand/cabinet for a 90 gal. tank & I'm planning to set it up as a planted discus tank. I would like to use some equipment I have from an old reef tank including a sump/wet/dry filter & Co2 system. I understand that a wet/dry can cause off-gassing of the Co2!

I've been out of the hobby for several years & I'm just curious if there's any new equipment or a diy design that may help with the off-gassing or make it more efficient.

[Consigliere]

Make it a wet sump, no trickling, add a lid, and have your filter output create minimal surface disturbance. That's most of what you can do I think.

The thing about discus is that so much water is usually changed that bio filtration isn't as important as some setups so the trickling aspect of a wet/dry is just overkill.

[zn394]

I have the same setup - a 150 with wet/dry that I bought used. I tried the CO2 as well and it had 0 effect because of the filter and my water's KH (pretty high at 180 ppm). Since my tank is "reef ready" with built-in overflows, I can't justify switching to a more CO2 friendly filter since the wet/dry is a very expensive one and it is excellent for oxygenating the water and handling almost any bioload I could throw at it.

I have read about covering the filter and doing away with the trickle part as well, but eventually decided to go low-tech and did away with the CO2, quit adding fertilizer, and reduced the lighting. I am now using plants that do well with the conditions of my tank and the result is very pleasing. As a bonus, I no longer have to work so hard at finding the right balance and my algae problems have virtually disappeared.

I like the low-tech approach for its simplicity (big believer in K.I.S.S.), but still have all the necessary equipment to try high-tech again when I get the right kind of tank - maybe a 75, 100, or 125.

Here are a couple of pics of the 150:

[Arkangel77]

zn394 - did you do the Wet Sump? Or did you just leave the Wet Dry as it was?