sweetwater stones

Re: sweetwater stones

I ordered 4 of the stones, from the page you recommended before, and mine too are a disappointment. I get large bubbles - maybe .25 mm in diameter, which largely rise and dissipate at the water surface. This post is the first I have seen about "fine pore" stones. I think you goofed before!! The discussion in their website catalog about the regular stones leads you to believe that those produce the finest bubbles that can be done, so I didn't try to find anything in their catalog mentioning still finer bubbles. Drat!

 

Re: sweetwater stones

Should be these:

 

Re: sweetwater stones

Those look just like the ones I got, and they definitely are not the "fine pore" stones. Maybe I should offer the remaining three for sale as "sweetwater stones", and hope no one else knows there are two kinds. (heh, heh)

 

Re: sweetwater stones

A couple weeks back I thought I'd give the mist method a shot and ordered several Sweetwater stones from AES. I only tried one of them, but it certainly didn't produce a mist of tiny bubbles the size of a period. Most were rather large (though probably smaller than a regular airstone), and floated rapidly to the surface even when placed in front of a vertical spraybar. Overall, it sounds pretty much the same as Cornhusker described.

I double checked the order receipt and what I ordered was AS10 = Fine-Pore Diffusers for Ozone and Pure Oxygen, 3/16" OD, ABS, 1.5" x .5". They look just like TW's picture.

The main thing that got me was the increase in CO2 expenditure required to get any sort of "mist" going. Normally I run about a bubble a second through my canister, but with the SW stone I had to crank the flow up until bubbles were just ripping through the counter. I never did let it all stabilize so I really don't know where the flow rate would have ended up when the pH was set. I just packed it in and went back to my original setup.

Is it possible we're doing something wrong? Normally, I've got the pressure regulator set to around 12-15 lb and the needle valve nearly closed in order to achieve 1 bubble/sec. With the SW stone, the regulator was the same but I opened the needle valve quite a lot.

 

Re: sweetwater stones

When I had mine going, the regulator was set in the 40psi range. They seemed to do better with the higher pressure. I got the small bubbles except where the stone touched anything, like the side of the tank or the substrate, there it was one big bubble.

BTW, that's not my picture, it's linked to another post here somewhere. But that's what my stones look like too. I've since switched to the Rio bubble-chopper powerhead.

TW

 

Re: sweetwater stones

The pic with the rulers is a pic I took of mine when they came in. Still haven't run them.

I just took these pictures of me blowing air through one of them with my weak lungs.

Blowing a little and then a lot.





Is this a fine mist? I suppose it might depend on the pressure you are running. It is finer with less pressure but when you blow through it you can get the bubbles just as big as any airstone. In order to get the small bubbles I had to blow just enough to leak some bubbles out, one or two tiny streamers. Any more pressure than that and it's normal bubbles.

It looks like a normal airstone to me.

 

Re: sweetwater stones

I bought it on aquabid labeled as mini moss. It came from singapore. Lotta stamps on the envelope.

It had thicker, more triangular growth in my Co2 tank. In this excel nano it looks longer because the strands aren't as thick.

 

Re: sweetwater stones

I just ordered a bunch o' them fine pore sweatwater stones. I hope they ARE the fine ones. I also hope they work better than my red sea diffusers

 

Re: sweetwater stones

Good to know, Thank you.

 

Re: sweetwater stones

I have been using an Eheim diffuser that I got from Dave Gomberg (http://www.wcf.com/co2iron/). Now that I had my disappointment with the Sweetwater stones I find I really appreciate the Eheim diffuser, and Dave has a very good deal on them. This diffuser is a glass disk type, that produces fine mist, has a built in bubble counter, a check valve, two sizes of tubing and an adapter to connect the two together (the Eheim diffuser uses very small diameter tubing compared to what is normal for connecting a regulator output.)