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

Succeses of the Week:

small_ranchu on the MFK site: "Here is the progress on my goldfish tank. 90 gallon tank with 3 goldfish + heavy feeding. Nitrate reading at the end of the week is usually around 40 PPM with a lot of brown algae on the wall. After 1 month of installing the Scrubber filter, Nitrate reading is 10 PPM and brown algae is disappearing slowly."

argi on the MD site: "I set up my scrubber on my 54 gallon tank a few weeks after its initial set up (it has been running for around 3 months now). One thing I have noticed on this tank compared to all my past tanks is the lack of algae growing on the glass. In the past I always left a magnet cleaner in the tank because I would have to scrub the brown diatom algae off the glass at least once per week. Now with this current tank I haven't had to clean off the glass nearly as often. While I still clean it, usually weekly to every other week, I can still see in the tank after 2 weeks!!! So far I am very happy with the results."

johnt on the UR site: "after 10 weeks of running a screen I can say it's the best method I've used, it also takes out metals and other nasties, and I've not even reached the turf algae stage yet. In the 10 weeks it's been running I've not run any reactors or the skimmer (I'm saving a small fortune not having to buy phosphate remover). I'm still running the refugium, Chaeto and deep sand bed, all corals are doing exceptionaly well, N&P are remaining low and rocks are looking better by the day."

Elliott on RC: "I built one about 5 wks ago and so far it seems to be working well. My cyano has diminished and there is less cleaning to do on the glass."

Mtroboer on the MASA site: "my algae is already visibly starting to disappear after only 1 1/2 weeks! Also added a PC Server fan in front of the screen and dropped my temps from 29.8 avg to 25.8 avg, saved me from buying a energy hungry chiller! First time in little more than a year I got to see results regarding getting rid of nuisance algae as well as dropping my high tempratures!"

Keifer1122 on the RS site: "Aquapod 12 gallon update: Its been couple days short of a month, and still no water change, my N & P have been at zero for 3 weeks now. everything is still growing just daily dosing, daily 2-3 feeding times a day, and weekly scrubbing"

bigtanner on RC: "I built this little one for about $65, pump, light, and all plumbing needed. Some people frown on these things and some people praise them. It's about like anything else really. I have had success with mine. Since building it and hooking it up, my tank is basically algae free. I also went from running my magnet daily to only running it every three to four days. [...] I never have any bad algae in my tank, my water is always crystal clear, and since adding it, I run my magnet a lot less than I used to.

corinna on the AC site: "I started out as a sceptic, but after spending a fortune on phosphate absorbers, carbon, sponges, water changes etc, Im convinced. Two months in, ive not done a water change or cleaned the glass, just to see what happened. Zooanthids are reproducing, seahorses are fat and active, values are reading zeroes. Scallops are happy. Plus I feed a lot."
 
Well after three months of testing color temps, I've determined that 3000K out performs 6500K. It's not a huge difference, but enough to notice. At first they are about equal, but as the green hair gets over an inch thick, the 3000K continues getting thicker until it hits the acrylic wall (at 1.5"), whereas the 6500 stalls and rarely grows enough to reach the wall. So I'm ordering all T5HO 3000K replacement bulbs.
 
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The Santa Monica Light-Screen

After much thought about design (but no ability to build), here is my version of a G3 scrubber:


LightScreenDrawing.jpg




A light-screen is a scrubber where the screen IS the light, and the light IS the screen. This changes the game when it come to scrubber performance in a small size. Unfortunately, you can't DIY these, unless you happen to be both a plastics engineer and an electronics engineer. However I thought that if I posted these, they may spark some ideas for regular scrubbers, or, someone may work for a manufacturer who can actually build them. I'll be the first to buy one.

As a reminder, G1 scrubbers are DIY sumps/buckets, while G2 scrubbers are enclosed acrylic boxes. G3 scrubbers have luminescent screens, whether they be LEDs, fiber optics, or lasers. My design is LEDs; so compared to buckets or acrylics, these plastic-covered LED light screens:

o Are ultra small/thin.
o Have no algae die-off (see drawing below).
o Are practically unbreakable.
o Are electrically safe (12 volts or less).
o Can be made as small as desired for nano's.
o Can easily be built into the hood of a nano.
o Are double-sided with almost no increase in size.


Disadvantages:

o They will be expensive (equivalent to good skimmers).
o They are impossible to DIY



LightScreenAdvantages.jpg




Here is my version of a nano scrubber:

Nano.jpg




Same concept, just smaller, and replaces the skimmer, mechanical filter, and other filtering "devices" in pre-fab nano's like Aquapods, Red Sea Max's, etc. Would actually make nano's less expensive, better filtered, more compact, and more reliable.
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Have you received the light kit yet? I'd like to know what parts came with it, i.e. resistor value and how many, capacitor value and how and what ever else. These I think I could turn out using my small CNC machine.
 
I thought you were going to order that LED light kit for the new scrubber. Or, was that someone else?
 
I was going to do a DYI system, not buy one. From the photos it looks like they are using red and blue, 2 red LEDs to 1 blue.
 
Trust me it's still diy. The hard/impossible part is sealing the unit in resin so that it's waterproof, yet can still keep the led's cool. And this panel is just a test to see if things leak... I don't think it's powerful enough.
 
I don't think it would need to be sealed in anything if the scrubber was built like the one you sent me. I need to find out the lumins for the LEDs and then step that up a bit. I can build a 12vdc and see how that works.
 
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