My Algae Scrubber Experience

Edmonton newbie · #1 01-20-2012, 04:09 AM

yup denny thats pretty much what mine is like just hang the screen and wait a week lol seeds itself and all you gotta do is harvest

Palmer · #2 01-20-2012, 10:12 AM

I was looking at the link just posted. For those of you that use this design do you cut off the zip ties attaching the screen to the pipe each week when cleaning the screen?

Edmonton newbie · #3 01-20-2012, 12:43 PM

no zip ties here i cut a piece of thin wall pipe a size bigger than my feed pipe and use a coupe of them instead

Proteus · #4 01-20-2012, 03:19 PM

Thanks for the info. Shall start a build right away

globaldesigns · #5 01-20-2012, 04:06 PM

Very cool, and the million dollar question is: Is it helping your tank and nutrient levels?

Edmonton newbie · #6 01-20-2012, 04:14 PM

global i doubled my feedings just to test it all out and found for the first time in 3 years i am running 0's in all my tests across the board, i brought a sample to the fish store and they got zeros too

Edmonton newbie · #7 01-20-2012, 04:15 PM

titus get on it lol works great hope to see your pics next week lol

pterfloth · #8 01-20-2012, 04:30 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by globaldesigns

Very cool, and the million dollar question is: Is it helping your tank and nutrient levels?

That's the only question that really matters. I held off posting anything until I had been running for long enough to answer that question. There is no doubt in my mind that my SPS corals have improved tremendously since I added the algae scrubber. Colonies that had shown no growth for the previous year are now growing like mad. Bright new growth tips are popping up all over. My LPS remain unchanged. The only downside I've noticed is that my red milli has become paler in color, not sure why. My blue milli is unchanged in color and growing faster.

As for nutrient levels, I use a spectrophotometer from work to conduct my nitrate and phosphate tests. Nitrate and phosphate are pretty much undetectible now, although they were never very high. I don't put a lot of stock in test results. How the corals look, how much hair algae and cyano I have is more important to me.

I'm not trying to advocate algae scrubbers. I'm just trying to share what is working for me. I tried the zeo approach and the bio-pellet approach, with RowaPhos, and they did not work for me. Nutrient test results were low, but hair algae was rampant and SPS growth had ground to a halt. I have a lot of fish in my tank, probably too many, and they have grown a lot in the past three years. Loonie-sized fish three years ago are now 8-10" in size.

I tried this out of desperation and it is the only thing that has worked so far.

Proteus · #9 01-20-2012, 04:36 PM

I think I have a design in mind. My question is. I run a gfo and carbon reactors. Does anyone see a issue with using there output for my water source. As it would eliminate the need for another pump. I thought of using my over flow but that would mean another light. I was planning on running this above my refuge and draining into.

reefwars · #10 01-21-2012, 07:47 PM

ok well i went and got all the materials today to build a algae scrubber, once i start building i will start a thread for the build and then to monitor the results and we will see how fast we get results, right now my phos is controlled by gfo but my nitrates are around 40ppm .

im thinking that instead of zipties onto the main pipe that my water comes out i will use a smaller size pipe that the mesh will ziptie onto, ill just shut off the valve,remove the end cap and slide the pipe out,ill make abigger otch out of the smaller pipe so it doesnt restrict flow but it only has one output anyways so i dont see that being a problem.

ill run to home depot later and see what they have for lights but besides that i have it all.