Do air pumps really provide oxygen into the water?

[Dr Joe]

lksdlkasdlka oh gawsh.. what came first, the chicken or the egg?

I was just answering the guys question without a bunch of yada yada

Let me ask you - If the bubbles were unable to break the surface, would they still oxygenate the water?

I wasn't around that long ago.

Yes, until an equilibrium is reached.

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PS. a canister output above the water surface is going to be 10x better than any airstone garbage IMO..

It's good to have opinions and beliefs.

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Sounds like you just want to be right and sound smart..

so you can be right.. even though my post basically agrees with all your technical mumbo jumbo but whatever makes ya feel good about yourself

cute science and facts comment

Thank you, I try.
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Thank you, I am. And sometimes I do.
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Thank you.
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It's all with love Miles.
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I just bet daveman12345 wishes he hadn't asked .

Dr Joe

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[justin guest]

My two cents worth. I agree 100% with the statements (about aeration ) from Dr. Joe. thats why I´ve installed airstones in hundreds of systems over the years.
j<><

 

[DaveB]

http://www.monsterfishkeepers.com/forums/showthread.php?t=160284

Hey, that's me!

(I'll be setting it up this week... finishing the de-scratching process today, I hope)


I don't use an air pump on any of my large tanks because I recall not liking the bubbling noises that we had in our tank back when I was a kid. I'm pretty sure I'd be fine with it now in all the tanks but the one in the bedroom, but they're definitely not necessary. You can tilt your XP3's spray bar to an angle of roughly 2 o'clock and that upward angle of the return will provide plenty of surface agitation without it making noise. Depending on how big the tank is, that may be sufficient. I have a 75 with two XP3s set up this way. It's silent, except when the water evaporates an inch... which is when I know it's time to do a water change.

If you like the look of air bubbles and can get it so it's not super loud, there's certainly no harm in using an air pump though. It's really just up to you. I personally am looking around for battery powered pumps to set up for each tank in case of a power failure. Noise be damned, I want to be OK if another ridiculous storm like the one last monday hits Chicago. Somehow we managed not to lose power in my neighborhood that night. But I don't want to take the chance of that happening while I'm not home.

 

[Bawb2u]

I know I'm coming late to this thread but I think there are some vital points missed in this discussion.
Primarily, the fact that air pumps pump air not oxygen. "Air" is a combination gas with it's main component being nitrogen (78%) not oxygen (21%). Secondarily, water has a high surface tension, so large bubbles will not outgas to a substancial degree in a fish tank with a height of 24 inches. I believe, that if you were able to measure the "air" content or volume of the bubbles produced by an airstone at the bottom of the tank and compare them to the bubbles *just* before they broke the surface of the tank you would find the difference to be negligible. If you wanted to add oxygen to a fish tank a more effecient way would be to do it in the same manner as a CO2 setup with a dedicated oxygen cylinder and diffuser.
I'm not a scientist and I don't play one on the internet but these facts just seem intuitive to me, so if I'm incorrect please feel free to explain my mistakes.

 

[justin guest]

I know I'm coming late to this thread but I think there are some vital points missed in this discussion.
Primarily, the fact that air pumps pump air not oxygen. "Air" is a combination gas with it's main component being nitrogen (78%) not oxygen (21%). Secondarily, water has a high surface tension, so large bubbles will not outgas to a substancial degree in a fish tank with a height of 24 inches. I believe, that if you were able to measure the "air" content or volume of the bubbles produced by an airstone at the bottom of the tank and compare them to the bubbles *just* before they broke the surface of the tank you would find the difference to be negligible. If you wanted to add oxygen to a fish tank a more effecient way would be to do it in the same manner as a CO2 setup with a dedicated oxygen cylinder and diffuser.
I'm not a scientist and I don't play one on the internet but these facts just seem intuitive to me, so if I'm incorrect please feel free to explain my mistakes.

Hi
A couple of important things first up.

Oxygen dissolves into water much easier than nitrogen.

Large bubbles don´t outgas to a large degree in a standard fish tank. The contact time is too short. Nobody in this thread said so. Some oxygen is released through the surface of the air bubble though. The greatest benefits of an air stone include that they bring oxygen poor water to the surface and that the surface is greatly agitated. To achieve this effect with a pump it has to be sitting on the bottom shooting water upwards... how many of you do this ?(I´m sure a couple of people but not most of you)

The volume of an air bubble is substantially larger at the waters surface due to the lower pressure at the waters surface. It´s composition is also different as some o2 will be released into the water.

The Oxygen dosing idea is used in Aquaculture settings but can be prohibitively expensive for the hobbyist. One air compressor for 30+ tanks in a fish room in the basement... How much pure Oxygen would be needed?
The oxygen has to be dosed almost as slowly as co2 for efficiency reasons. This means if you´re trying to degas co2 on the other hand, you don´t have as much agitation in the water with an o2 injection system as with an airstone. The balance between o2 and co2 is also very important. High o2 + high co2 = sleepy fish that don´t feed well (co2 in higher doses becomes an anaesthetic for most fish species). And for the specialists reading this and thinking about using an oxygen separator, just wait for the next electricity bill - They chew watts!

Hope that helps you
j<><

 

[cmartin]

I have a question....

If the power goes off and the filters are no longer running for a period of time, would adding some sort of aggitation to the water surface help?

We have had a lot of storms lately and although the temp is not a big issue, I was wondering what could be done for aeration.

 

[justin guest]

I have a question....

If the power goes off and the filters are no longer running for a period of time, would adding some sort of aggitation to the water surface help?

We have had a lot of storms lately and although the temp is not a big issue, I was wondering what could be done for aeration.

Hi
Check out this link;

http://www.monsterfishkeepers.com/forums/showthread.php?t=48578

j<><

 

[DaveB]

The links in that sticky are outdated, but you can get the Penn Plax B-11 at Aquatichouse.com for only 11.99. For some reason I thought all the battery backup ones were like 50 bucks. I just bought four of them for less than that. Totally worth it.

 

[Pharaoh]

OK, great thanks Rallysman. I didn't mean to come off agitated, but I was a bit frustrated! I have the Rena XP3 so I don't have a wet/dry filter. So, in theory having an air pump will indeed provide oxygen into the tank due to it causing bubbles at the surface which somehow enhances the oxygen level? I'm realizing that the technical way to think about it is: an air pump basically pushes air into the water that does not create oxygen on the spot. What happens is, when it hits the surface of the water, the oxygen is brought in due to the agitation and the bubbles popping. So indeed, it does bring in oxygen?

To note: Before when I had just the air pump on full, while the canister filter was bringing in water underneath the water, the fish seemed to be gasping for air. Now, when I put the canister filter input above the water level causing the waterfall, they seem to be just fine.

Just take the spraybar of you XP3 and point it somewhat upwards so that the water ripples. You do not have to make it splash, just ripple. This is exactly what I do with my XP3 and my fish are fine.

 

[brianp]

If I’m not mistaken, I believe I once read an article which stated that in the ocean, crashing waves cause significant oxygenation of surface water by forcing billions of microbubbles into the water. These microbubbles have a tremendous surface area and undergo gas exchange with the surrounding water. Unfortunately, this situation is not duplicated in an aquarium by the use of an airstone. I have no doubt that any column of rising bubbles will undergo some gas exchange with the surrounding water, but the smaller the bubble diameter, the less effective the bubbles are at generating physical water movement and hence, circulation within the tank. On the other hand, my guess is that a rising column or curtain of bubbles would have a collective surface area that could/would match or exceed the surface area of the tank. For me, it comes down to exposing a certain volume of water to a certain surface area of atmosphere and then being able to circulate the water. I have never used an airstone or comparable bubbling device, but have relied instead upon circulating surface water. This has worked quite well. However, you could probably achieve the same effect by augmenting an airstone with a powerhead or other pump-type device to circulate the bubbled water.