Light diffuser safe?

See what using the proper name got me. I'm looking to keep base rock off the glass. My tank is also 29" deep so there will be quite a bit of weight on it. I've heard of the white stuff leaching phosphates. So I was a bit concerned.

Matt

 

I have read somewhere that it can leach phosphates in a tank.. I cant remember where I read that though.. I mean it is a plastic which is a petroleum product..

 

As long as you change the water regularly, I don't see how it could add phosphates faster than you're taking them out. I can tell you that we have these in our tanks and the phosphates are 0. We got them from home depot, rinsed them off first, and haven't had any issues.

 

I had to research this subject on a thread recently

I found a number of articles/ threads/ posts on other site which shared a common theme
of Acrylic egg crate or light diffuser releasing Phosphates over a period of time

common findings where - frag racks where getting cyno and or other algaes growing on them, when the rest of the set up remained free of this nuisance

found a number of common suggestions/ comments ( bear in mind I must have visited half a dozen other sites in this research)

PVC eggcrate has not been found to have this problem
rinsing the acrylic egg crate in vinegar , was indicated as solving this problem
painting the egg crate using Krylon Fusion, which seals it solves the problem

I do know it took a lot of juggling with the text on my search parameters
a simple "problem with egg crate in reef tanks" search gave me nothing of any use, from this location

worth hitting google and doing a search "egg crate and phosphate issues" as that was the one that gave me most hits

I dont know if its a real problem, a major problem or a percieved problem

just letting you know I did do a search and the above is a summary of what I found

Steve