New Algae Scrubbers

[SantaMonica]

Low-light Scrubbers

 

Here is something new, different, and untested, but which may suit nano's perfectly since it would be cheap to operate. I have not built one yet, but it should work for either SW or FW if the size and flow are correct. It is a vertical scrubber that you hang on the wall, and it requires NO electricity. It is a "low-light" scrubber:

 

 

 

 

 

I got the idea when reading a study about algae growth in freshwater streams:

 

"Algal Response to Nutrient Enrichment In Forested Oligotrophic Streams". Journal of Phycology, June 2008. http://www3.interscience.wiley.com/journal...083425/abstract

 

"Algae inhabiting forested streams have the capacity to acclimate to low light intensity. These light conditions affect their photosynthetic efficiency, but do not impair growth rates, in particular, in the case of thin diatom-dominated communities."

 

In other words, they don't filter as much per square inch (or per square cm) of area, but they do operate on very low light. Apparently it is mostly diatoms that grow in these low-light conditions.

 

The advantage of a scrubber like this should be obvious: It requires no electricity to power the screen. It still requires a pump, however, since the top of the scrubber would (probably) be high above the top of the tank. The scrubber is designed to operate on the light already available in the room, which would vary greatly depending on how strong the light bulbs are in the room, and how much sunlight comes in through the windows. The more average light the room has, the smaller the scrubber can be. The less light, the bigger it needs to be. Basically, the scrubber uses more area to make up for less light. And since the light is so low, the type of algae that is able to survive is (apparently) mostly diatoms.

 

Just as with regular scrubbers, the wider the unit it, the more flow is required. So in the spirit of keeping it from consuming too much electricty, a smaller pump could be used if the unit were narrow and tall. But the bottom of the unit will need to drain into either the tank or the sump, so there will be a limit to how low the bottom can be. And the limit to the top will be the ceiling. A tradeoff will need to be made, maybe so that it looks like a vertical picture on the wall. Fortunately the flow does not need to be as much as a regular scrubber, since it is one-sided only.

 

It will have to be experimented with to see if a clear cover is needed to stop any water dropletts from splashing out. Many people have decorative waterfalls of the same size as these, and they have no cover on them, so maybe water dropletts getting on the floor will not happen. Evaporation would be high though, and this might be reason enough to consider a clear cover.

 

Cleaning could (apparently) be done by having a removeable screen or porous sheet, just like a regular scrubber has. It would be big though, and would drip as you took it out. Also it probably would not fit into a sink, and so would need a bathtub or shower (or outside) for cleaning. A possible fix for this might be a very flexibe woven plastic mesh, which you could fold up like a towell and easily clean in a sink. A material like this might not lay down flat when it's in the scrubber, however.

 

This type of scrubber would be easiest to try for somebody with a cement floor, lots of wall space, open widows or skylights, a low sump, high ceilings, and a big sink or patio for cleaning. I have no idea of the size required for the unit.

[SantaMonica]

New Feeding Guideline:

 

Each cube of frozen food you feed per day needs 12 square inches of screen, with a light on both sides totalling 12 watts. Thus a nano that is fed one cube a day would need a screen 3 X 4 inches with a 6 watt bulb on each side. A larger tank that is fed 10 cubes a day would need a screen 10 X 12 inches with 60 watts of light on each side.

[dtfleming]

Sigh.......................

[p-daddy]

I heard that giant screens of muck are a new interior-design craze. I want one right next to the pictures of my family and my HDTV.

[not_sponsored]

This guy again?

[franklypre]

You should try it. Document everything, take pics and post them up here. Show these guys you know what you are doing. Keep us posted.

[Markushka]

I heard that giant screens of muck are a new interior-design craze. I want one right next to the pictures of my family and my HDTV.

I want one on every wall!

[paneubert]

I at least give the guy props for the picture he made

[Deleted User 6]

and just when i thought it couldn't get worse. IT IS NOT ART YOU DO NOT HANG IT ON WALLS I AM DISAPPOINT!!!!!!

[p-daddy]

[Deleted User 6]

i liked the other one better p

[p-daddy]

This? Figures you would catch me, copied/pasted the wrong link

 

[BLoCkCliMbeR]

thanks for the idea, i just put mine up, looks kinda like this

 

its the best i could do, i didnt feel like searching google images for a framed picture of $#!T on the wall...

[p-daddy]

You should try it. Document everything, take pics and post them up here. Show these guys you know what you are doing. Keep us posted.

 

I just had a brief surge of guilt based on what frank said, if this is something you genuinely believe in you need to create something with valid experimental design utilizing the scientific method, document it, and post your findings. Even if you didn't have a track record of posting an onslaught of misinformation thats not really in direct reply to anything nobody in this hobby respects anything without concrete research. I'll admire your desire to be an innovator albeit misguided or your ability to troll.

 

With that said I think in the original scrubber post we beat that horse to death so, /conscience off.

[brandon429]

enjoy reading Santa Monica's stuff after talking to him in a lot of pm's he's good by me, good scientist, knows theory and app well, doesn't waste time defending the lamer insults.

 

Id read his ponderings for sure, across forums and half a million+ views there's just too many positive responses with tons of picture and maturation documentation to ignore, thousands of different posters, scrubber intergration into reef sytems may be old, but doing it like this and in nanos is not...Im most impressed by the repeatability of his work, these online posters en masse have no reason to back him when the bandwagon is more welcoming.

 

 

when I looked at the picture evaporation struck me and then I read something you said about encasing it in plastic or something like a big picture frame. who knows if it would work in this way, its the brainstorming thats beneficial for invention.

additionally, Id like to know how you arrived at that consumption/fixation rate for a cube of food. if thats accurate its very helpful to be able to correlate plant biomass to a given nitrogen source...done right this could really help some of the high nitrates threads.

[SantaMonica]

Id like to know how you arrived at that consumption/fixation rate for a cube of food.

 

First just by watching my tank and comparing it to other reports, especially those who had zero N and P, how big there scrubber was, and how much they fed. Then built the FW nano and ran it with 1/2 of the nano scrubber for many months. They all somewhat agreed, so I normalized it to a usable number. No dry weight testing, though.

[brandon429]

a cube is a lot of food for sure, nanos don't need that much nice to have a safe zone for relatively heavy bioloading. a scaled test version for a pico would make a great model for the larger approach and vice versa.

[HecticDialectics]

Low-light Scrubbers

 

Here is something new, different, and untested, but which may suit nano's perfectly since it would be cheap to operate. I have not built one yet, but it should work for either SW or FW if the size and flow are correct. It is a vertical scrubber that you hang on the wall, and it requires NO electricity. It is a "low-light" scrubber:

 

 

I dunno, I guess I could hang a 4x2 foot "low light scrubber" full of algae on the wall...

 

or I could just stick with a sump and a skimmer hidden below my tank

 

choices... choices...

[franklypre]

Well it's nice to see this wasn't a total bashing. I'm moderately interested in this, do you have DIY construction plans or can I go buy something that can be modified for this purpose. I honestly think on of the wall pictureframe tanks would work well. Not good for much else. Algae scrubbers are a constantly changing idea, if you could make one that worked well and didn't take up alot of room I would be willing to try some out on my larger tanks. My only concern is that it will clog up when the algae grows out.

[BLoCkCliMbeR]

just a thought.....what if this was outside, had a door(window) on it that would swing open and you could just spray it off with the hose outside...out of sight, out of mind, no pissed off wife, no fire hazard....

[SantaMonica]

Well it's nice to see this wasn't a total bashing. I'm moderately interested in this, do you have DIY construction plans or can I go buy something that can be modified for this purpose. I honestly think on of the wall pictureframe tanks would work well. Not good for much else. Algae scrubbers are a constantly changing idea, if you could make one that worked well and didn't take up alot of room I would be willing to try some out on my larger tanks. My only concern is that it will clog up when the algae grows out.

 

If you mean the low-light "picture frame" scrubber, no there are no plans or drawings or tests. It would be experimental. If you mean the nano, see below. As for clogging in the low-light, my understanding is that it will only grow a thin layer of diatoms, which if you used a grey screen, you would not see at all, and also they would probably be too thin to clog a drain (hair algae needs much brighter light than just room light). If you mean clogging in the nano scrubber, it has backup drains halfway up.

 

 

 

[wombat]

Can we see a picture of a nice looking tank filtered with an algae scrubber?

 

How does an algae scrubbed system deal with dissolved organic carbon? DOC will rise just like nitrate and phosphate in a system devoid of filtration strategies that target it (protein skimming, GAC, GFO).

 

Thanks.

[p-daddy]

Can we see a picture of a nice looking tank filtered with an algae scrubber?

 

How does an algae scrubbed system deal with dissolved organic carbon? DOC will rise just like nitrate and phosphate in a system devoid of filtration strategies that target it (protein skimming, GAC, GFO).

 

Thanks.

 

I'm with wombat, I'm interested in seeing a healthy tank which uses this method (or any turf scrubber method.)

 

The more I toss this idea around, I'm also curious as to why more aggressive forms of algae like hair algae won't grow under the more powerful lights in the display, effectively out competing the low-light algae?

[BLoCkCliMbeR]

Can we see a picture of a nice looking tank filtered with an algae scrubber?

 

How does an algae scrubbed system deal with dissolved organic carbon? DOC will rise just like nitrate and phosphate in a system devoid of filtration strategies that target it (protein skimming, GAC, GFO).

 

Thanks.

 

well not to compare this to his last thread, but WHERE is this miracle tank with such an apparatus? with either his original fire hazard or his updated "low light" idea? the algae scrubber forum has pics, but they sure are no zeovit, nano, or reef central TOTM....

 

of all the flaming his threads have taken, its never once said that ATS could not filter a tank, it just wouldnt do it in the biblical proportions that he claimed....

 

again, a scrubber system that was outside, that had minimal equipment, used the sun, and could be cleaned with a garden hose outside..... might be something to think about...

 

its something only home owners could really rig up. shoot, i wouldnt mind having a green house with a ATS system tied into my main system as a supplement.....im sure i could put something else in there with it...

 

as long as it wasnt a framed turd in my living room, or could possibly burn my house down,i would think about it.

 

its all about being "green" these days.....and the less i had to mess with my water the better

[Deleted User 6]