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Fe still the cheapest co2 method?
- Thread starter creg
- Start date
AverageWhiteBloke
Member
I would have to say yes over the long term once the equipment is bought. I paid £70 deposit on a 5kg pub bottle then get it refilled on average once a year on a 100ltr tank for £15. The commercially made bottles are a lot more expensive and hard to come by locally so when I factor in delivery gets too expensive. Being able to fill my bottle locally also means if I run out sooner than I thought I'm back in the game the next morning.
A lot of people try the fermenting method but it's very unreliable and by the time you've bought all your bags of sugar for the year you wouldn't be far off buying a cylinder I guess.
A lot of people try the fermenting method but it's very unreliable and by the time you've bought all your bags of sugar for the year you wouldn't be far off buying a cylinder I guess.
tubamanandy
Member
Is it relatively easy to get hold of pub type 5Kg CO2 bottles (small/squat style) in the UK ?
AverageWhiteBloke
Member
Yeah, generally speaking every town has at least one place that supplies all gases, co2, butane, argon etc. Some are more specific to welding and some for caravans etc but there's at least one in every town around me. FE on the other hand, the nearest place to me is about 30miles away so its actually easier for me to get pub bottles than my FE changed. Now that I've had mine changed a few times I have the mobile number of the various guys who service fire extinguishers in my area. When I'm due one I just give them a bell and meet him the next time he's in town. They tend to serve business's changing Fe's when they are due a check, usually they will just give them a new FE and take the old one away to be checked, re-date it and pass it on to the next customer rather than servicing it on site so they usually have a few in the van which they know are still in good working order.
Must be something to do with H&S that they replace them every 12 months or so.
Must be something to do with H&S that they replace them every 12 months or so.
Nothing to do with H&S.
FE's have a manufacturing date stamp stamped on the cylinder. They are not to be used as fire extinguishers after that time. The cylinders are rated to 10 years before they have to be pressure retested. This is normally not worth the cost so they are destroyed (or given to fish keepers
).In a business the CO2 FE's must be inspected every year. Basically are they in correct place, are they damaged and have they been used (they have a full weight on them).
AverageWhiteBloke
Member
I'm also lucky in a way with working in shopfitting. Many times on site when a building has been took over by a new client they will take away all the FE's and replace with new so I usually offer to buy the old ones. Don't do it as much these days because of my 5kg pub bottle. I only use the 2.5KG FE on my shrimp tank which is only lightly dosed and 5gall, haven't changed it for a while.
zozo
Member
No idea if it is realy that much cheaper, i guess you need a bit of luck to have a FE supplier near selling out of date bottles cheaply.. Where i live i pay € 25 for 5 kilos of co2 refill. What makes it expensive is the deposit i have to pay for the bottle, that's about € 120 one-off deposit/rent for a 5 kilo bottle.. Next time when bottle is empty i can trade the empty one for a full one for € 25, or get the deposit back and leave the bottle.
I guess in the UK it's about the same, you have to calculate how much does the fillig cost and how much is an old FE.. I do not have a local FE supplier and have to search second hand privately, averagely the price of an old 5 kilo fe is in the same range, it only saves me that €120 deposit if i find some.. 5 kilo almost lasts me a year, so getting a FE €10 cheaper doesn't realy save me so much money in the long run. That would be different with a very big aquarium using 5 kilo's a month.
I guess in the UK it's about the same, you have to calculate how much does the fillig cost and how much is an old FE.. I do not have a local FE supplier and have to search second hand privately, averagely the price of an old 5 kilo fe is in the same range, it only saves me that €120 deposit if i find some.. 5 kilo almost lasts me a year, so getting a FE €10 cheaper doesn't realy save me so much money in the long run. That would be different with a very big aquarium using 5 kilo's a month.
