[puopg]

Are you talking about a CO2 generator? As in baking soda and citric acid? Or are you talking about CO2 over calcium carbonate?

Im talking about standard CO2 regulator setups with pressurized tanks. Since your regulator has a "working pressure" that it is down stepping the CO2 tank pressure to. Obviously if that is set to like 1 PSI, you probably won't have enough to run anything. Im just curious as to how you can tell if you have set an adequate "working pressure".

So for example, diffusers require a lot more working pressure to operate, as theres more resistance against the gas. So there must be some threshold where there is enough PSI to push through the resistance. However, my question is, once you have reached that threshold, does increasing it further do anything as we typically have needle/metering valves to fine tune the output. I hope that sorta makes sense what im getting after? Perhaps there is a better way to phrase what I'm trying to get some insight into.

 

[puopg]

You typically set a regulator to ~20-30psi. This is your working pressure, after it has been stepped down from the high pressure. From this point, you introduce a metering valve into the equation, and you don't really think about the pressure on that side of the business.

The truth is, the "working pressure" isn't all that important, to a large degree. You wouldn't set it to 1 psi, because changes in ambient temperature could negate your pressure, to the point that nothing flows - or the flow would be unstable, and the output inconsistent. I also want to say (if memory serves) that a typical one way (check) valve needs about 2-3 psi to open. On the other hand, if you have more than 30 psi, you may find that a solenoid (of the category that we'd normally use) could have trouble operating against the pressure. So, this is the working pressure range that has been found to be stable in most climates, assuming household climate controls.

Yea I mean that's generally what I have been doing, I was curious more to an explanation behind the mechanics of this hehe.