Algae Scrubber Basics

[_shorty_]

If you're doing a vertical you can get a piece of clean acrylic that's pretty dang thin and plaster the velcro hooks on both sides.

Look at the hooks with a magnifier. You may see they're all oriented in one direction. You'd want the hooks up if that's what you see.

If you have any HA in your tank you will have it immediately catching on the velcro.

Thanks for the input. I'll have to check the orientation of the hooks when I get home tonight... I noticed it did catch a little already.

I did think about using acrylic or even thin plastic from hobby store. But this time around I figured I'd test just the velcro by itself (got the sew on kind with no sticky backing). It works out in this scenario because my water delivery method is a little different (no slotted pipe), and my screen just hangs down into the water flow held at top surface of the lid of the A.S box by some CPVC cut all the way through on one side that basically just clamps down on the screens to grab them. That way I can easily just pull the screens out without turning off water flow. I admit it WAS a challenge to get the new soft velcro screen into the CPVC 'clamp' - so if I do another velcro screen, I will definitely use the sticky back kind with the thin plastic or acrylic.

 

[khowst]

ok, so I re-read 3251 repeatedly but it doesnt really cover 1W LED spacing, amount or my question. I'm reading 1W LED's are better, and the price on ebay and equivelant sites are cheaper than alot of brand name sites. From my under standing they run at 350ma vs 700 ma of 3w. Anyone have 1W expereince and can answer or pm me please?

 

[_shorty_]

ok, so I re-read 3251 repeatedly but it doesnt really cover 1W LED spacing, amount or my question. I'm reading 1W LED's are better, and the price on ebay and equivelant sites are cheaper than alot of brand name sites. From my under standing they run at 350ma vs 700 ma of 3w. Anyone have 1W expereince and can answer or pm me please?

If you go back a couple pages you can see a pic of mine I just put together. I got my 1W LED drivers off ebay from a manufacturer in China (so expect LONG delivery times - like 3+ weeks). I don't have any results to support my design yet - so take this for what it's worth: My fixture is two sided 6" x 8" - so 15 LEDs spaced within that was exactly 1.5" centers from LED to LED - 5 length ways by 3 width ways.

 

[srusso]

ok, so I re-read 3251 repeatedly but it doesnt really cover 1W LED spacing, amount or my question. I'm reading 1W LED's are better, and the price on ebay and equivelant sites are cheaper than alot of brand name sites. From my under standing they run at 350ma vs 700 ma of 3w. Anyone have 1W expereince and can answer or pm me please?

Where did you read 1w is better? That is not true...

 

[khowst]

Where did you read 1w is better? That is not true...

According to Floyd on # 3261.

1W chips are much better, IMO, for Algae Scrubbers, because you can pack them closer together, put them closer to the screen, and get near-perfectly even coverage. This mainly applies to off-the-shelf fixtures, which usually have one circuit board and the individual LED dies are close together. It's hard to get 3/4" spacing using 1W chips on stars. But if you have ever had the opportunity to see a 1W LED grow lamp array in person, you would agree that they are bright as #@$&*^!%. I'm talking blindingly bright, and extremely even coverage. As far as the wattage comparison for those "“ not sure. The "œ1/5" numbers came from the DIY 3W LED folks"¦

 

[khowst]

Right on, thanks shorty exactly what I was looking for.

 

[_shorty_]

Right on, thanks shorty exactly what I was looking for.

Don't know if you're doing Red & Blues. But I will add - Mine are all Reds - I ordered some blues - but the 3 x 5 array of LEDs poses the problem of symmetry when adding the blues. So when I add blues - mine will probably be more like 7.5:1 ratio.

I went as cheap a route as I could, and based on my 1" alum square tubing heatsync/structure - I was a little limited on layout. But over-all, I'm pleased with it. Turned it on that first time - my son and I both looking RIGHT at it, and OWE!.. I think we probably both still see red spots when we close our eyes. :facepalm:

 

[rrasco]

1 week running...is this normal growth? That's the non-lit side.

 

[sabbath]

Here is mine at one week.

Sent from mobile

 

[Skinnysloth]

One week update:

Took it out to clean gently with just my fingers and not much came off. It felt pretty well attached to the screen. This was with the 10w 660nm red leds on each side. You can see the it's brown/darker at the top where the light is hitting the screen directly and greener at the bottom. You can tell where I didn't rough up the screen at the top as there was little to no growth there. There wasn't much growth at the very bottom of the screen as that was submerged in the water.

 

[terahz]

Okay, I figured my 1 led 1/2" from the screen, unprotected is not going to cut it:

And I said I'd give the scrubber a fair chance so I built me a small HOS (Hang on the Side) scrubber box:

Pretty good fit and it has plenty of space for expansion should I upgrade my tank and/or decide to feed more (if the scrubber ever proves useful).

Lights upgraded to 4+1 Deep Red/Royal Blue "3" W on each side, 700mA. I had a meanwell laying around so I figured I'd hook it up. And no, I didn't leave it there

One more weekly chore, sheesh... anyone figure out automatic scrubbers yet?

I'll report once anything grows on it.

 

[_shorty_]

Okay, I figured my 1 led 1/2" from the screen, unprotected is not going to cut it:

And I said I'd give the scrubber a fair chance so I built me a small HOS (Hang on the Side) scrubber box:

Pretty good fit and it has plenty of space for expansion should I upgrade my tank and/or decide to feed more (if the scrubber ever proves useful).

Lights upgraded to 4+1 Deep Red/Royal Blue "3" W on each side, 700mA. I had a meanwell laying around so I figured I'd hook it up. And no, I didn't leave it there

One more weekly chore, sheesh... anyone figure out automatic scrubbers yet?

I'll report once anything grows on it.

Nice looking box. Good work.

 

[nanomania]

how many 1w 660nm led per sq" ?? what should be the flow rate for horizontal? (im making both...

 

[Floyd R Turbo]

The generally accepted guideline (I guess, accepted by me) for 3W LEDs is a minimum of one per 20 sq in, and a maximum of one per 4 sq in (with a diffuser).

If you take into account that 3x 1W LEDs will actually be more efficient than 1x 3W LED, then I would have to say that you could probably do a minimum of 1x 1W LED per 8-10 sq in of screen, and a maximum of one per 2 sq in. Theoretically, an array of LEDs that are individually less intense but much tighter should yield the same overall intensity at the screen and be more even, perhaps negating the need for a diffuser, and still being close to the screen.

The downside is that when you are comparing a 3W Philips Luxeon ES 660W LED to a knock-off 1W LED, you lose something, and it is quantifiable, and it does make a difference. So if you're using cheap 1W LEDs, use more of them than you think you need. There may also be a large variance in forward voltage and spectrum, which may or may not be a bad thing (broader spectrum, but possibly they are all from one bin that is a less effective spectrum)

I know not about flow rate for horizontal. I would say, fast. I dunno. Sorry.

 

[Jstdv8]

Wow, i love you guys' work. I really need to learn how to use acrylic like that!

 

[edgey]

I've heard of people scrubbing with Chaeto and getting an awful lot of growth. Is the waterfall scrubber better than Chaeto? If so, why?

 

[_shorty_]

I've heard of people scrubbing with Chaeto and getting an awful lot of growth. Is the waterfall scrubber better than Chaeto? If so, why?

My uncle has been in hobby for a long time and used horizontal algae scrubbers for many years.. after seeing his setup (before getting back into the hobby a few years ago) is when i started researching and found santamonica's original FAQ on the ATS. I've been using the vertical design since then.

With my uncle's design, his are all above tank which are fed from a pump in sump that then the cascades down through about 4 or 5 different horizontal acrylic boxes - each with a light fixture on top (granted his is a 300 gal tank). But, he 'seeds' his scrubbers with a certain type of macro algae - don't remember exact one - if it's not chaeto, it's something similar. He then just pulls out handfuls every once in a while.

His works well to my understanding - but it would definitely be a lot harder to DIY - and he's running PC fixtures over about 4-5 different horizontal A.S. acrylic boxes - so I'm guessing more energy going into the system than some of the current popular designs.

 

[nanomania]

My uncle has been in hobby for a long time and used horizontal algae scrubbers for many years.. after seeing his setup (before getting back into the hobby a few years ago) is when i started researching and found santamonica's original FAQ on the ATS. I've been using the vertical design since then.

With my uncle's design, his are all above tank which are fed from a pump in sump that then the cascades down through about 4 or 5 different horizontal acrylic boxes - each with a light fixture on top (granted his is a 300 gal tank). But, he 'seeds' his scrubbers with a certain type of macro algae - don't remember exact one - if it's not chaeto, it's something similar. He then just pulls out handfuls every once in a while.

His works well to my understanding - but it would definitely be a lot harder to DIY - and he's running PC fixtures over about 4-5 different horizontal A.S. acrylic boxes - so I'm guessing more energy going into the system than some of the current popular designs.

can u post pics with specs. of your uncles horizontal ATS?? im planning on it coz in one of my tank i dont have space for vertical... other im going for vert. in the sump...

 

[crn005]

Just to make sure, when talking about using blue lights to hit the Chlorophyll B requirements (445nm), would the Philips Rebel ES Royal Blue (440-460nm) be the ideal LED? Also, how beneficial would including some CREE XP-E Red (620-630nm) in addition to the Philips Rebel ES Deep Reds (66nm) be? I was thinking about using 2 x 660nm, 2 x 620-630nm, and 1 x 440-460 per side of a 24 square inch screen.

 

[crn005]

Also, where did the estimates of wanting to hit the 445nm mark come from? Every places I researched showed Chlorophyll-A spiking at 430nm and Chlorophyll-B spiking at 453nm. Is this just to try and straddle the two?