Peroxide - you guys will think I'm nuts

[Dez]

Ok. Here's my dosing schedule. First I mix up a batch of hydrogen peroxide. I buy 30% stuff by the barrel for my pond, I dilute it 50ml to 450 ml ro/di water. This makes it to approximately 3% I think. Then whenever I'm doing my daily "check the sump room to make sure nothing is leaking", I'll stick 5 - 6 tablespoons of my mixed H2O2 straight into the sump. My tank volume is approx 350 - 375 gallons in my best estimation.

[asylumdown]

awesome thanks! Once I've got my whole system back on track and I sort out a better nitrate control system, I'm going to try that out as a regular maintenance item. 6 tablespoons is about 89 mL, so that's about 0.25ml/gallon per day. When you think about it, 89 mL of 3% in to a 350 gallon system is like diluting an already highly diluted solution another 15,000 times, and it's a compound that all eukaryotic cells have sophisticated enzymes in place to rapidly decompose. I bet at those concentrations it's not even directly killing the visible algae or the bacteria, but possibly oxidizing spores in the water column or destroying dissolved organics that wouldn't/haven't been picked up by your skimmer. If you've got even the tiniest bit of organics in your water, at that concentration it's probably completely decomposed before any of it reaches your rocks.

PS, where do you buy 30% H2O2? I thought only laboratories could get it that concentrated?

[Sebae again]

I bought mine from a health food store.

[Proteus]

Hydroponics store carry 30% also

[pinkreef]

Is using the commonly sold 3% stuff the same thing?

[asylumdown]

Originally Posted by pinkreef

Is using the commonly sold 3% stuff the same thing?

yes, but I'm not sure I'd put 30% H2O2 directly in a tank, that stuff is crazy reactive. Most accounts I've read of people who use it for whatever purpose dilute it down to 3% before letting it come in contact with water/rocks.

When you do automated particle size analysis in a soils lab you need to digest all the organics in your sample or it messes up the sand/silt/clay distributions. My lab uses 30% peroxide to do it. The reaction is usually strong enough to boil the water in your reaction vessel. If you get it on your skin it instantly turns snow white to a depth of about half a mm, though if you rinse it off right away it will eventually get its normal colour back.

It's very potent stuff. Safer for all involved if it's diluted first. The benefit of 30% is that you get more for your money, and if you ever wanted to make a batch with a higher concentration for something like cleaning a filter sock you could.

[Relect]

The 3% from the drug store usually has a stabilizer added to prolong shelf life once opened. For salmon we use 200 ppm of 35% for prophylactic treatment of fungus with no harm to fish. We dilute and use immediately as once mixed with water the extra oxygen molecule leaves the solution. This also raises D.O. quite a lot.

[gregzz4]

Originally Posted by Dez

Ok. Here's my dosing schedule

Thanks for the info Dez - Greatly appreciated

[Reef Pilot]

Does dosing hydrogen peroxide have any effect on corals? I thought some corals culture photosynthetic algae?

Also, don't tangs and some other fish need some algae to graze on? I don't think just nori is good enough for them.

I found the best solution to beating excess algae was to get the phosphates right down to zero (hanna checker, not the color test kits) with HC GFO. Then any hair algae would literally let loose, and was easy to clean up. But as soon as the P04 got up to near 0.1, it would reappear. And SPS does best when it is near zero.