phillyfishguy
New member
thats why I am on this forum is for help and research lol. I like the idea of some sort of algea that is harvested in my system. always looking for help
Algae Scrubber Basics
- Thread starter srusso
- Start date
Floyd R Turbo
Either busy or sleeping
Looks very good! It this for your 120 gallon, or your 34?
Coral C's
New member
So, my ATS has been running for 5 days now. The screen is solid algae!! And it's starting to grow stringy now. I had macro algae in my sump which at some point broke up, but, but it got into my display. And it must have gotten into my powerheads. A few little slices, are now 4-6" pieces of macro growing out of my powerhead!!
So, with the algae from the ATS, the macro growing in my sump and powerhead, how can I still possibly have HA growing in!! Urrg!! Well, hopefully another 2 weeks and the HA will start to slowly dissipate!!
So, with the algae from the ATS, the macro growing in my sump and powerhead, how can I still possibly have HA growing in!! Urrg!! Well, hopefully another 2 weeks and the HA will start to slowly dissipate!!
srusso
Active member
Sorry... That will not be enough light. You can try and use drop lights like mine, very first posts.
I just finished mine today...Opinions would be helpful
I only had room for two light instead of four so I hope that is enough, I am also limited in how far away the lights can be placed so i hope they are not too close.
Thanks
srusso
Active member
Some pictures of the screen and tank would be nice.
Don't worry about the algae on the power head, it won't have a chance soon. The sump may need some light blocking. My setup suffers from the same problem, but that's just the thing it not really a problem... I put live rock rumble down there a little algae grows for the pods to live in.
salty joe
Active member
I just finished mine today...Opinions would be helpful
I only had room for two light instead of four so I hope that is enough, I am also limited in how far away the lights can be placed so i hope they are not too close.
Thanks
I"d think that hitting the screen with light at a right angle would be a good idea. Also, how will you remove the screen fer cleaning?
Coral C's
New member
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Did you buy those lights at a Home Depot / Lowes?
I also noticed that you have a tube coming out of the end of your ATS and going into the sump. Is this because of too much flow? I have a dedicated pump and it seems like quite a bit of flow coming out of the end that is capped on mine. So would be better to have an outlet back into the sump like in yours?
Did you buy those lights at a Home Depot / Lowes?
I also noticed that you have a tube coming out of the end of your ATS and going into the sump. Is this because of too much flow? I have a dedicated pump and it seems like quite a bit of flow coming out of the end that is capped on mine. So would be better to have an outlet back into the sump like in yours?
Coral C's
New member
I may look into the hanging light's so I can use 4 instead of two lights, my only concern is how to hang them under the tank.
The pvc tube and elbow are not glued in so I can remove just the top tube that has the screen on it.
salty joe
Active member
Gotcha. Once this thing is up & running, it might be worthwhile to add a union. BTW, I was in Home Depot yesterday and they carry 100% silicone designed for polycabonate and plastic sheeting. It was with the acrylic sheets, not in the paint dept. Don't know how well it works or if it's reef safe. I'm not positive, but I think the same solvent welds polycarbonate and acrylic. In which case I'd think this special silicone would work equally well on acrylic.
Coral C's
New member
Don't mean to sound dumb but - what is a union?
I was able to find some weld-on, had to drive for it but atleast it have it now.
Thanks
Dave1NC
New member
That's not sounding dumb at all. Here's a pic of what it looks like. We are all learning together
.http://www.usahardware.com/products/manufacturers/united/images/h8041010.gif
It basically connects two peices of PVC together.
I am going to building two screens for my ATS I was able to salvage several pieces of PVC from previous tank builds.
salty joe
Active member
Yeah, they screw apart and have an O ring for a watertight seal. Readily available at Home Depot, Lowes etc.
phillyfishguy
New member
so much good information here... Question I have two 1.5 inch drains from over flow. I would have one of them going to my skimmer would it be okay to have the other one go to the ATS then into my sump. Not the skimmer I have is external so its not in the sump. The sump is 48 by 18 by 18. Or should I use my return pump to pump water up to the ATS then back into my sump?
King_Richard
New member
2n1/2 Week Update
2n1/2 Week Update
My little update on the scrubber. For the first two weeks of my redone scrubber I was rinsing the screen and occasionally scraping it every 3 days or so since the black stuff was covering it rather quickly in areas. It's about time for another cleaning of it either today or tomorrow but I did a water change the other day and tested only for nitrates which are now pretty much 0, I can't see any color difference and the natural seawater that I use has the same reading of 0. So within the two weeks of my rebuilt scrubber, my nitrates have dropped from the almost 5ppm to 0ppm. Also, in the older thread, I was the one who had the nasty case of green water, well our water is now crystal clear and my standards for calling it crystal clear are rather high, lol. The only things in the water column are food that we feed and live food from the dsb and scrubber that make it into the display tank. It's clear enough that you don't see the light rays penetrating through the water if that makes sense.
The only problems I've encountered so far is that I'm getting a squirting noise from the scrubber and using 2 x 26w CFL's on each side of my 15x12" screen has resulted in no growth in the middle. I'm now testing out 2 13w CFL's on one side to see if it make a difference, I also changed all bulbs to the 2700k version instead of the 6500k. Around the edges of the screen is nice build up bright green algae, hard to see in the pics though since I stirred up alot of crap that's covering it all right now.
Anyone with a solution for the squirting, air rushing through the slot noise? I'm also using a pvc full of carbon on the end of the scrubber that lets a small stream of water out, however, if I keep the end of the tube open, then the air noise is gone. Rather not take the open end route though since I'm sitting rite near the 35gph per inch rule.
Enjoy the pics, the geen polyps and orangish ones are our newest additions, just wanted to show em off. Just remembered that I cheated and pulled out most of the cyano that was growing in the sump when I was cleaning the other day. Originally I said that'd I'd leave it be and see how the scrubber handled it but I couldn't take it anymore since I had to put a sick coral down there to keep the flame angel from picking at it.
2n1/2 Week Update
My little update on the scrubber. For the first two weeks of my redone scrubber I was rinsing the screen and occasionally scraping it every 3 days or so since the black stuff was covering it rather quickly in areas. It's about time for another cleaning of it either today or tomorrow but I did a water change the other day and tested only for nitrates which are now pretty much 0, I can't see any color difference and the natural seawater that I use has the same reading of 0. So within the two weeks of my rebuilt scrubber, my nitrates have dropped from the almost 5ppm to 0ppm. Also, in the older thread, I was the one who had the nasty case of green water, well our water is now crystal clear and my standards for calling it crystal clear are rather high, lol. The only things in the water column are food that we feed and live food from the dsb and scrubber that make it into the display tank. It's clear enough that you don't see the light rays penetrating through the water if that makes sense.
The only problems I've encountered so far is that I'm getting a squirting noise from the scrubber and using 2 x 26w CFL's on each side of my 15x12" screen has resulted in no growth in the middle. I'm now testing out 2 13w CFL's on one side to see if it make a difference, I also changed all bulbs to the 2700k version instead of the 6500k. Around the edges of the screen is nice build up bright green algae, hard to see in the pics though since I stirred up alot of crap that's covering it all right now.
Anyone with a solution for the squirting, air rushing through the slot noise? I'm also using a pvc full of carbon on the end of the scrubber that lets a small stream of water out, however, if I keep the end of the tube open, then the air noise is gone. Rather not take the open end route though since I'm sitting rite near the 35gph per inch rule.
Enjoy the pics, the geen polyps and orangish ones are our newest additions, just wanted to show em off. Just remembered that I cheated and pulled out most of the cyano that was growing in the sump when I was cleaning the other day. Originally I said that'd I'd leave it be and see how the scrubber handled it but I couldn't take it anymore since I had to put a sick coral down there to keep the flame angel from picking at it.
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bennyhanna1
New member
Glad I found this thread, I love the idea of the ATS and am interested in implementing in a future build. I like the trough design, have people found an optimal angle of the trough or width? I was toying around with using an old 10g tank or something, angling it under the stand, and drilling a hole for an outlet so the ATS would be 20x11 or i'd use a smaller tank that's about 17x9 or so...
salty joe
Active member
flworkd, can't wait to see your scrubber up & running. Can't you dial in the spectrum pretty tightly with LEDs? It seems you could get ones that produce almost nothing but PAR and have a really efficient scrubber. Isn't it a fact that any wavelength other than PAR is wasted energy as far as growing plants is concerned?
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