This part is key. When I asked if you did a soapy water test, I'm referring to putting soapy dishsoap type water in a spray bottle, and spraying your bubble counter, needle valve and solenoid connections to detect mciro bubbles. I wasn't referring to bubbles in the bubble counter. You might have a leak somewhere, and the only way to tell is to see where bubbles form in the soap.When I turn the needle valve I do check and see the bubbles in the bubble counter.. It seems like everything is working perfectly, no leaks anywhere from what I can physically see/hear..
The needle valve comes after the gauge sets in the vast majority of rigs. Are you talking about the working pressure knob on the regulator body?Btw high pressure on the regulator reads 850-900 psi and the low pressure reads around 30ish psi when I turn on the needle valve a little bit.
And I would connect the solenoid to a timer to turn off co2 at lights out and turn it back on ~30 mins before the lights come back on.BPS is a meaningless measure as it depends on the working pressure, and your needle valve's orifice size. A more meaningful approach is to shoot for a specific co2 concentration in your water. A general rule of thumb for planted tanks is around 30 ppm. The relevance of BPS is even more removed from your target because of factors like your pH, temperature, flow, surface agitation, plant density, light, you fish etc etc.
Measuring co2 concentration is a pain. The easiest and cheapest tool is a drop checker that gives you an approximation as a reference point. You best and more important indicator us your fish: start sloooow and watch the fish. If they are gasping at the surface, you are injecting too much - back off right away.
'Tuning' your co2 can take couple of days, turning up your co2 and leaving home for a day is a bad idea. Keep checking your fish every hour or so. Once you get where you want to be, daily checking can save a taknfull of fish.
The key here is time and patience.
As an example, I cannot even count bubbles in my high light 65g tank - it's a stream. In my lower light 60g tank, it's a trickle.
Take it slow, watch the fish. Any questions, ask. That's what TPT is all about. And enjoy the process.
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I figured as much, that you had a leak somewhere. As mentioned, the bubbles per second is not as important as the pH drop. Keep an eye on how low the pH goes to ensure you have just enough co2. This can be done by adding a drop checker, or measuring the pH/KH as per the co2 chart.It turns out that the end of the silicone tubing connected to the needle valve was slowly slipping off the needle valve entirely after 6-10 minutes..
