Bubble Scrubbing and the Red Bug Scourge
- Thread starter Orcus Varuna
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Bpb
New member
Not really. I always have some salt creep on the rim but I have a canopy and messy fish that splash a lot anyway
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Knighthawk
New member
I could see salt creep in the sump an issue if you are pumping in more air than the return pump can handle. I have mine turned down so all you see is a slight bubble coming up in the sump. Still produces plenty of bubbles in the display tank.
Another issue I run into from time to time is my bean animal drain sucking air. The bubbles are cutting back on the amount of flow the return pump is pushing and causing the tuning of the gate valve to be incorrect. Haven't figured out how to correct this besides really turning down the air pump.
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Another issue I run into from time to time is my bean animal drain sucking air. The bubbles are cutting back on the amount of flow the return pump is pushing and causing the tuning of the gate valve to be incorrect. Haven't figured out how to correct this besides really turning down the air pump.
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Bpb
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You and me both. They'd be gone after a few treatments. If one large dog pill treats 280 gallons I was using half a pill for my 86 gallons net water volume. Pills weren't expired. Skimmer shut off and carbon removed for each treatment. Called for 3 treatments. I did 4.
After the first round of 4 the bugs were gone. Then a month later they were back (I added absolutely nothing new to the tank).
Second round of 4 treatments I even didn't use carbon or water change at the end of each week either. Just added 1/2 pill every week. They were gone again. For about a month. Then they showed up yet again
Did everything by the book and then some. Even at the risk of the health of the rest of the tank and the bugs persisted. I'm certain they were standard red bugs.
Started bubble scrubbing a while after they returned, months. And within the first week of scrubbing, PE was better than I'd ever seen it and there were no bugs to be found. A month later I still can't find a single one
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Bpb
New member
Might be an eye sore but have you considered putting the airstone inside the display under a powerhead instead? I run a durso so it's not a problem but on the next tank I'll run a herbie and probably just zip tie the airline to the wire on a powerhead and let the airstone produce bubbles in the display.
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Dsekula
Member
Depends on how you do it
Since I'm in planning stages of a build it's something to consider. I'd do the same normal powerheads, then a set of "air powerheads" on a timer. So if your still using the same amount to begin with it wouldn't mess with flow. Hopefully I articulated that correctly and it makes sense lol.
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fijisrfr
New member
Air stone in front of power head doesn't achieve the same results
1. The reason for putting the air stone in front of the return is so the bubbles are sucked into the pump then get all chopped up into micro bubbles like the skimmer produces
2. I would think that putting it in front or below Power head won't chop up the bubbles the same way the return pump would.
3. Basically, you are turning the tank into a giant skimmer, dissolved organic coated bubbles make their way to the sump/skimmer for removal, tank has never looked better.
However, I can't speak to the usefulness in getting rid of red bugs.
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1. The reason for putting the air stone in front of the return is so the bubbles are sucked into the pump then get all chopped up into micro bubbles like the skimmer produces
2. I would think that putting it in front or below Power head won't chop up the bubbles the same way the return pump would.
3. Basically, you are turning the tank into a giant skimmer, dissolved organic coated bubbles make their way to the sump/skimmer for removal, tank has never looked better.
However, I can't speak to the usefulness in getting rid of red bugs.
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Bpb
New member
What if your powerheads have greater flow than your return pump does though
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Dsekula
Member
I did an expariment yesterday to see how my tank inhabitants would react to bubbles . Not that setting this up seems really hard but before I put forth effort I figured I'd do this little check. I just took my power heads and twisted them so the heads we're slightly out of the water (again just to see how the tank inhabitants reacted) this did give a tank full of bubbles. My clown fish cowered in their nem and rock dwelling type fish hid under rocks. One of my torch coral went nuts with sweepers (1 of 5). My little acro frag slimed up like expected. The only tank inhabant that really seemed to hate bubble contact was my Maxima clam. The clam closed up tight and didn't reopen untill about a half hour after the bubbles were gone. I only left the tank bubbled up for about an hour to see how everyone reacted to this but figured I'd post what I noticed in my tank.
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Bpb
New member
Yeah the sound of the powerhead drawing air will definitely frighten the fish. Maxima clams are rock boring and usually in very shallow foamy water. They're perfectly adapt at air bubbles. They'll close up temporarily just to avoid bubbles in their siphon and if any do get in they can burp themselves
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Dsekula
Member
I hear ya Bpb, I just wanted to post my first impressions on my tank. This morning when my lights came on the tank did seem clearer or something (idk how to describe this exactly since the water has always been clear) there was some noticeable gunk that had gotten knocked from the rocks, some was on the setteled sand bed and some still leaving the water colum. When checking my morning readings my po4 had increased from 0.04 the night before to 0.08 . It's worth mentioning that I do the 6days of feedings and skip the 7th and yesterday day was skip day. My best guess is that this helped pull all this gunk from the rocks that increase po4 not that the air increase po4 .
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Dsekula
Member
Now here is the issue I have with the process of air scrubbing as it has been described.
Mag and direct drive pumps arnt imtended to run with air and water mixing through them. These are the two most commonly used return pumps. Running air through them causes the impellers to turn non-uniform or what I and my coworkers refer to as "the wobble". When this is done on a regular basis the insides of the pump wear scoring marks and notches and softer rubber parts are ripped apart. The pump will continue to oerate but very loud and the life span will greatly decrease as it gets chewed up. Mag drives will take longer to show issues than direct but I've yet to see this not happen at all. I'll post a pic of the pond pumps I rebuilt due to this issue to illistrate what I'm talking about. these ran for 4 months continus (from date on purchase) with water 1/2" below the top of the pumps due to the owner not realizing that this was an issue. This is from a little giant PES-1000-PW not some cheap knock off garbage btw. Since the client no longer wanted these and declared them garbage even though they could be fixed and used properly these are now the pumps I'm using on my aquarium.
How do you guys that do this regularly combat the wobble?
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Mag and direct drive pumps arnt imtended to run with air and water mixing through them. These are the two most commonly used return pumps. Running air through them causes the impellers to turn non-uniform or what I and my coworkers refer to as "the wobble". When this is done on a regular basis the insides of the pump wear scoring marks and notches and softer rubber parts are ripped apart. The pump will continue to oerate but very loud and the life span will greatly decrease as it gets chewed up. Mag drives will take longer to show issues than direct but I've yet to see this not happen at all. I'll post a pic of the pond pumps I rebuilt due to this issue to illistrate what I'm talking about. these ran for 4 months continus (from date on purchase) with water 1/2" below the top of the pumps due to the owner not realizing that this was an issue. This is from a little giant PES-1000-PW not some cheap knock off garbage btw. Since the client no longer wanted these and declared them garbage even though they could be fixed and used properly these are now the pumps I'm using on my aquarium.
How do you guys that do this regularly combat the wobble?
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Knighthawk
New member
I would pick up an airstone and some type of airpump and give it a try. When I run mine at night the tank gets almost to the point where all you see is little bubbles. You have that huge sump down there so it should be pretty easy to hook it up.
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