Observation

[StirCrazy]

Originally Posted by Samw

Hey Brad, 10 years ago IS the mid 90's. So bare bottom and DSB were equally used in the '90s I take it to mean??

bare bottom was the standard along with crushed coral. in the mid 90's the plenum showed up and about the same time DSB. plenum and DSB are still two different creatures, one relying on manual removal of waist water the other relying on the sand bed to reduce its own waist. both also included Skimmers as a necessary component.

now that the fads are over people are returning to what was working be for ie. bare bottom tanks.

I think the reason for this is simple, the DSB will not function correctly in a captive system, according to the good Dr, we have only 1/100th of the variety of "bugs" to make a DSB work, and it also tends to trap a lot of crap on its surface in lower flow areas like under rocks (you should have seen mine when I removed it yesterday, top 1/8th inch UUUUGLY the rest was still new). the BB allows for complete siphoning of waist from the bottom of the tank, it allows for higher flow rates along the bottom of the tank and in between rocks keeping junk suspended so the skimmer can remover it.

Steve