Mega-Powerful Nitrate and Phosphate Remover Replaces Skimmer, Refugium, part 1-4

[wanabedriver]

I'm looking into building my own ATS filter this week(end), and was trying to plan it out as much as I can on paper before I start cutting and drilling...

Recently, I remember reading that currently the most ideal method to get the water from the pipe to the screen is through slits perpendicular to the screen. Is this still the case? I remember starting with a 1" spacing at first, but I do not remember the GPH to # of slits guideline... I think it was relatively high since the slits get pretty big.

Also, has anyone tried drilling a line of holes as an alternative? I have relatively low flow, estimating it to be 80 GPH, so I'm trying to spread out the water as wide as possible without drying out sections...

Finally, is this table from the first page for the full-length slit? I assume I might be able to get by with a wider screen if I have smaller holes...

Screen Width-----Gallons Per Hour (GPH)
2" 70
3" 105
4" 140
5" 175
6" 210
7" 245
8" 280...

 

[Ace25]

This is how the slot should be cut.

 

[wanabedriver]

Thanks Ace. But I think I don't have enough flow for a very wide strip, so I might have to do some experimenting with smaller slits or holes to spread out the water more 'efficiently'.

 

[SantaMonica]

Just do a width that you do have the flow for. Then just make it taller, if you have the bulbs to cover it.

 

[SantaMonica]

A reminder about lighting:

Stronger lighting is always better, until you start "burning" the algae. Burned algae will be yellow, because it is getting too much light but not enough nutrients from the flow. More light requires more nutrients, which give you more filtering.

So if you have yellow growth, increase the flow so that more nutrient are delivered to the algae. If you can't increase flow, then add some iron. If you can't add iron, then reduce the number of hours the lights are on. Do not reduce the wattage, however; stronger light for less hours is better than weaker light for more hours, because weaker light will grow darker algae. Stronger light grows bright green algae, which does the most filtering.

 

[jessie]

morgan at inland says the best algae to grow is the purple algae. its suppossed to export twice the nutrient load of green. my turf scrubber is a dump system and i have used it for about 3 years and its worked great. i dont know if the constant flow type grows the same algae in the same way but if it does i would say purple is the way to go.

 

[SantaMonica]

Darker algae does hold more nutrients, but they block more light. So the only thing filtering is the layer that is facing the light: When one strand is facing the light, the other side of it is dark, and vise versa. With green, the light goes through it, so both sides of the strands get light. And when it gets thick like 3D spaghetti growth, it's the most powerful because the flow goes throughout the strands. Plus, the flow is 100 percent of the time. Not 10 or 20 percent. Plus, it's two sided, not one. Plus, it's DIY-able. And most important, it's been tested in over 1,000 systems from just my threads, which don't include the threads I don't post on.

The real test, however, is when you start to feed. A 10 X 10 inch vertical waterfall scrubber with a total of 100 watts can filter 10 cubes a day with no other filters and no water changes. I have two of these on my 90 gal, and between the liquid coral food, silversides, and nori, I'm totalling 25 cubes of food per day, with no waterchanges for 3 years.

 

[SantaMonica]

This is an experimental fix for brown/black growth, and also for extending the life of the bulbs past 3 months:

1. Use bulbs with twice the wattage as recommended; so use 2 real watts per square inch (6.25 sq cm) of screen. Thus a screen 10 X 10 inches = 100 square inches would get 200 total real watts of light instead of 100 watts.

2. Run the lights for half as many hours as recommended; this would be 9 hours instead of 18.

3. Around 3 months, when the growth starts to get darker (because the bulbs are getting weaker), start increasing hours until it grows green again. When you reach 18 hours, it's time for new bulbs.

This does a few things: The first is obvious; you will get longer bulb life as long as you remember to increase the hours when you get to 3 months. But stronger light can also turn black/brown growth into green, no matter how high the nutrients are, if the light is strong enough. The trick is just to not burn the algae; thus the hours have to be less.

When the light is strong (compared to the nutrients), more of the growth is physical algae, and it's also more green (less proteins). When the light is weak (compared to the nutrients), more of the growth is DOC and dark physical growth (more proteins).

 

[SantaMonica]

Coming Soon: Good news for nano owners who want scrubbers. If you have not been able to easily put a scrubber below or above your tank, this might work for you. And you probably already have the parts to make it.

 

[SantaMonica]

LED test on SM100:

9 days of growth after cleaning. Fluorescent on left, LED on right. LED is the 50 watt Grow Light from EshineSystems in China. Actually uses 41 watts per the KillOwatt. Was raised up 3/4 inch to fit in middle of scrubber window. Camera is unfortunately an old one, since new one is being repaired. Growth was very similar on both sides; too similar to tell them apart. Growth on the LED side was floating a bit higher since it had no light near the bottom. LED was about $140 including shipping, and I asked for the black case:

Video:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LKcib4YaoTc

LED:
http://www.eshinesystems.com/growlight/50W-led-grow-light-3g.htm