Mega-Powerful Nitrate and Phosphate Remover Replaces Skimmer, Refugium, Everythin

I chose an algae screen because my previous setup of skimmer, gfo, carbon and polyfilters could not get the algae off of my rocks and back wall (was completely green) without dosing vodka. The vodka worked but caused red slime and irritated the fish. Also, an algae screen (without skimmer) allows me to have filter feeders (gorgs, sponges, dendro's, flower pots, cauliflowers) which stay open and feeding 24/7, and also provides swarms of pods for the corals to eat (and the small damsels too).

Algae has been used for aquarium filtering from the 70's that I know of. I like the small size ones in the bucket, although my new acrylic one which sits on my sump will hopefully be my favorite once the growth kicks in.

 

Do not pretend you know me, or how much I have given to others in the way of reefing knowledge. I've been giving good solid advice for well over 10 years.

Your post said the is the "exact" stuff you have and I was simply telling you it is not. You said Liquid Life is "live" phytoplankton and it is not. I am not addressing my posts to "the reader", just you Just suck up the facts and don't try to belittle those that point out flaws in your post. With some minor corrections and a simple change of tactics I bet you'd get a much greater positive response then you have.

 

Algal filters are merely an adaption of freshwater techniques used for ~4,000 years now. If you search hard enough you will find references to it's marine use going back to the early 50's.

 

You are right, I meant Phyto Feast Live by Reef Nutrition, which I also use.

 

Today's build of the day is another one made from a gravel vac. These are easy because you don't need a special cutting tool to cut the slot in the pipe:

 

I just finished up some diagrams of the most-used screen installations. The overflow-feed is good because it usually has a very large flow capacity, but, you can't turn off the return pump for too long or the screen will dry out. Also, pulsing the flow is not easy:




The pump-feed below will free you from the return pump, and makes it very easy to pulse the flow using a timer. But the pump must be able to deliver 35 gph per inch of width of the screen:




The sumpless-feed (or "bucket"), which was the original design, is how you get the screen up above the tank. The pump in this case goes in the tank itself. Also, the walls of the bucket let you flow more without worrying about water spraying sideways:

 

Reminder Of The Day:

Yellowing of the water: This is due to cleaning or scraping the screen while the screen is still in the tank water system (i.e., "in-system"). When you break algae strands, they release their chlorophyll related chemical contents, which drain downwards. If your screen is still in-system when you clean it, it drains into your tank system water, causing yellowing. Another cause of yellowing is not cleaning your screen at all. Solution: Clean your screen at least once a week, and do it by taking it to the sink and running tap water over while you clean it.

 

I have a 100G freshwater tank with 8 goldfish in it. it's nearly 3 month old. A 35G sump under the tank has bioballs for bio filtration. after reading through this thread I decided to give it a go with in sump version. here is how it's been set up. The lights are 25w(125w) at 2700k and 6500k energy saving type. The screens are filter mat on acrylic sheet sit at around 45 degree. it's been setup for a week. the result is BLACK MOSS/ALGAE. what's missing???

 

Nothing wrong with black algae; look at the pics of the LFS test earlier in the thread... pure black. Here's the last pic before it's first cleaning:



All algae use nitrate and phosphate. Have you measured it?

 

jski711 on the RS site says his scrubber fixed up his pH:

"my ph was dropping too low because i wasn't running my skimmer. the skimmer would help get rid of a lot of the co2 that was comming from the effluent of the reactor into the tank. so i turned my reactor off and i couldn't run my skimmer because of a medication i put in my tank, the skimmer would just overflow with bubbles in a matter of seconds. so i was running no skimmer and no reactor for about a month and a half. then after installing the scrubber i noticed that my ph was on the rise and has been high sometimes 8.5ish. so i figured the extra co2 from the reactor would bring the ph down and also help with micro growth. no more ph problems, im amazed at how much this scrubber has raised my ph. again awesome idea santamonica!!!"