Algae Scrubber Basics

[Southpaw007]

I am setting up a peninsula 20, and I am trying to find a way to put an algae scrubber In the middle chamber. it's to small for a hog or drop style from Santa Monica. I don't want to externally plumb a waterfall type, so are there any ideas that would work in the middle chamber?

Sent from my SAMSUNG-SM-G891A using Tapatalk

 

[SantaMonica]

Put an airstone, and screen with strings attached, in there.

 

[karimwassef]

Are we talking about an in-tank scrubber??!! Yes.. finally, we've arrived!

That's exactly my plan on my new tank. I use the bubbles to create a wall of algae that the fish can't access... then I turn off the air and let them graze when it's long enough. Sequestration and recycling in-tank!

I thought it was only possible on big tanks like mine but if it's feasible on small tanks, that would rock!

 

[Floyd R Turbo]

@karimwassef, I can't tell if you're being sarcastic or if you haven't heard of the UAS

 

[karimwassef]

Upflow scrubbers have been around for a while. It's putting it inside the display tank that I think is novel and I am excited to do it.

 

[iced98lx]

In the middle chamber.

User in question was asking about putting it in one of the 'back' chambers of his AIO, not within the visible DT if I understand correctly.

 

[karimwassef]

awwww... so still doing the weird on my own I guess.

 

[bozoreefer]

Well I am jumping into the scrubber world!

Got one for a real good price from a local guy that built a tank that never got it up and running and just parted out. It's from 302 Aquatics, so not as good as Turbo's unit (which will likely be what I purchase later if this attempt goes well). But it should still work for what I need.

I'll try to remember to take some pics of my progress. Just hooked it up last night. Only thing I have noticed with this design is these flood lights get quite warm when in my cabinet closed all day, wondering if it will have any impact on water temp, thinking of adding a fan or two in there to provide some airflow.

Look like these, but are white light not red (maybe swap them??)
https://www.amazon.com/Floodoor-Lig...=1507573133&sr=8-5&keywords=plant+flood+light

How do these lights work for you?

Sent from my SM-G955U using Tapatalk

 

[salty joe]

awwww... so still doing the weird on my own I guess.

Haha, I've heard it said that it's lonely at the top. You've done a lot of cool and innovative things. Keep rolling!

 

[bozoreefer]

What do you guys think of sticking the roughed up mesh sheet into a lighted reactor?

I saw a guy do it on YouTube and he has success. It's pretty much the same method as a chaeto reactor except you have the mesh screen in there.

Sent from my SM-G955U using Tapatalk

 

[bozoreefer]

Here's the video https://youtu.be/eigiaiZWtfc

I know in the video comments Santa Monica was concerned about air flow into the reactor.

My idea is to add an air valve into the water input of the reactor. A venturi concept like our skimmers


What do you guys think?

Sent from my SM-G955U using Tapatalk

 

[karimwassef]

I've done something like that before. The problem is bacteria. Without the air mixing, bacteria set up shop and in some cases totally overwhelmed the algae... and I ended up with a cyano reactor instead of an algae reactor.

 

[iced98lx]

Oh, in case it helps, here is what it looks like after 10 days of growth:

A fresh 10 days:

1113172106

[/url]1113172106a

Denser, better anchored. I pulled 3-5x that from the DT though. I have a DC6000 standing by, in case it needs more flow.

 

[Floyd R Turbo]

Sounds like it's competing with the tank algae, what's your DT lighting type, intensity, schedule, etc?

Do you have a lot of corals?

What are your water params?

Offhand I would say, intensity is OK but with the DT competition, you might not be able to push it much harder based on that growth color. But, you should be able to extend hours. I would go to 16 or 18, same intensity (4)

Then I would consider adjusting the DT lights in some fashion, this will depend on corals, but essentially making is less algae-friendly by backing them off somehow, and let the scrubber out-compete it. Make a small change for a start and see if that shifts growth to the scrubber. Don't make a huge change, that can shock the system. Just a test and observe results (10-20% reduction, etc). If it seems like that makes a difference, then up the scrubber intensity and flow a bit and observe, then continue down that path.

 

[iced98lx]

Sounds like it's competing with the tank algae, what's your DT lighting type, intensity, schedule, etc?

LED + T5, very intense, T5's 12 hours LED's 6 (LED's do not ramp in, just turn on for 6 hours then off like a MH would)

Do you have a lot of corals?

Yes

What are your water params?

CA: 500
Alk: 8.3

I don't test phosphate or nitrate typically but I'll see if my ULR phosphorus tester has good reagent.

Offhand I would say, intensity is OK but with the DT competition, you might not be able to push it much harder based on that growth color. But, you should be able to extend hours. I would go to 16 or 18, same intensity (4)

I'll extend the lighting time by an hour a day until I get to 16 and leave it for 10ish days and see where we land. I'm running the scrubber opposite the DT lights, should I run it at the same time? I am not worried about PH at night as I dose soda ash overnight.

Then I would consider adjusting the DT lights in some fashion, this will depend on corals, but essentially making is less algae-friendly by backing them off somehow, and let the scrubber out-compete it. Make a small change for a start and see if that shifts growth to the scrubber. Don't make a huge change, that can shock the system. Just a test and observe results (10-20% reduction, etc). If it seems like that makes a difference, then up the scrubber intensity and flow a bit and observe, then continue down that path.

I really, really don't want to change the DT lights if I can avoid it. Coral health is good, with strong growth and good coloration. It's been a long road after my child came to get the tank back to growing coral reliably and this would be a last ditch for me.

Thanks for the guidance.

 

[Floyd R Turbo]

I'll extend the lighting time by an hour a day until I get to 16 and leave it for 10ish days and see where we land. I'm running the scrubber opposite the DT lights, should I run it at the same time? I am not worried about PH at night as I dose soda ash overnight.

You can run it opposite the DT lights, that's fine. Don't worry about overlap, that's fine also (obviously, you were running 24/7 so you're not worried)

I really, really don't want to change the DT lights if I can avoid it. Coral health is good, with strong growth and good coloration. It's been a long road after my child came to get the tank back to growing coral reliably and this would be a last ditch for me.

I can understand the reluctance. That's why I didn't suggest a blackout or anything like that. I was thinking more like going to 11 hours T5 and 5 hours LED in your case. Doing that (or even 2 hours off of each) shouldn't adversely affect your corals, and if you're keeping track of algae growth in the tank and scrubber, you should notice a bit of a difference.

I also have to wonder if the algae growth on the rocks is a result of built-up nutrients over time, that is now leeching out. That's the tough one to beat when you have encrusted corals, it just takes time to leech everything out (sometimes, 6-12 months). The nutrients and light are right there on the surface of the rock, so the algae gets first crack as it's getting released from the rock structure.

Nitrate and phosphate levels would be good to know. My guess is that they are reasonably low, if not zero.

 

[iced98lx]

You can run it opposite the DT lights, that's fine. Don't worry about overlap, that's fine also (obviously, you were running 24/7 so you're not worried)

I can understand the reluctance. That's why I didn't suggest a blackout or anything like that. I was thinking more like going to 11 hours T5 and 5 hours LED in your case. Doing that (or even 2 hours off of each) shouldn't adversely affect your corals, and if you're keeping track of algae growth in the tank and scrubber, you should notice a bit of a difference.

I'll cut LED by an hour and see if that helps. To be honest I was strongly contemplating going the other way and extending LED to 7 hours but I can always experiment with that once the algae in the DT is under control. I'll make that change this week.

I also have to wonder if the algae growth on the rocks is a result of built-up nutrients over time, that is now leeching out. That's the tough one to beat when you have encrusted corals, it just takes time to leech everything out (sometimes, 6-12 months). The nutrients and light are right there on the surface of the rock, so the algae gets first crack as it's getting released from the rock structure.

Nitrate and phosphate levels would be good to know. My guess is that they are reasonably low, if not zero.

I would assume there is some amount of build up certainly. For a long time I just let let it grow, pulled it and didn't worry assuming it'd slow down when it finished leaching. Just seemingly never finished. I stopped testing phosphate as it consistently came back 0 with the GHA growth in the tank sucking it all up. The only time I've had any was when I ran GFO for a month, then stopped abruptly, prior to the GHA regrowth I measured some phosphate. I did use Lanthium Chloride on the rock prior to it going in the system several years ago.

 

[Floyd R Turbo]

The issue with leeching, IMO, is that it's 2 stages (potentially) - short term and long term.

The short term is the soft surface that dissolves rather easily. Can't recall the term for this. Anyways, it still takes time to leech this off so a short treatment with water that is heavily filtered with GFO or treated with LC will pull out the phosphate out of the water, but not the rock - unless you "cooked" the rock, and regularly treated/filtered the water.

The long-term is where you have crystallized calcium + phosphate deposited on to the rock (this happens rather easily in the tank). This can only be released by acid treatment (pH must be below about 7.0) or in-tank via bacteria (PSBs = phosphate solublizing bacteria). It's a theory that fits the results on PSBs. Bacteria and algae work symbiotically to "cleave" phosphate from the rock. The bacteria create a highly localized low pH area that breaks the bonds. When the bond breaks, that pH jumps back up, so it takes a long time for a large amount of rock to get "cleaned up" when this process is happening.

It's possible that "cooking" the rock (for months) puts this process into overdrive.

So the net is that if you have old rock that has built up a lot of waste over time, it can take a long time to reverse that.

There's actually logic in "burning it out" by increasing the DT lights duration/intensity...but that usually means, lots of hand-harvesting, and risking corals getting ticked off.

 

[iced98lx]

I just always assumed get my inputs and outputs inline (thus my effort on the ATS) and eventually things will stabilize. I have 3 tuxedo urchins and a scopas tang and keeping up is a laughable proposition at this point. My plan is get the ATS maximized, if it can't keep up it's either bigger ATS or big fuge with big lights time.

 

[anothermineral]

Thoughts on using a 20W LED flood light that uses multiple lights vs. just one to make the total wattage.

For example, between the following:

https://www.lightingever.com/20w-super-bright-led-flood-lights-ww.html

and

https://www.lightingever.com/1600lm-20w-outdoor-led-flood-lights-3400049-ww-us.html