Algae scrubbers

[Godfrey]

I have been looking into trying an algae scrubber for my 80 gal fowler. To those of you that are using them how do you like it. Do you use it with other filtration. Would you do anything different than the basic model. Any feedback is much appreciated

 

[Pushwood]

I made a DIY scrubber, they work fantastically! I use it with my skimmer. I would highly recommend setting one up.

 

[Godfrey]

I'm using a filter sock now and it seams like it catches a lot of large particulates I was hoping to keep that and incorporate a scrubber also.on an 80 gal tank what size scrubber should I build

 

[Pushwood]

I recommend doing some reading on sizes, the screen size has been researched a lot lately and they changed the recommended size of the screen to how much you feed daily in your tank, I think (don't quote me) its for every 1 cube of frozen food you feed a day your screen size should be 12 square inches.

 

[Godfrey]

Have been doing a lot of reading on it. Just finished the most helpful

piecehttp://www.aquariumdomain.com/viewArticle.php?article_id=19

Basically it says .5 to 1 actual watt per gal for lighting and 1 square in per gal on screen size so that gives me a screen size of 8 x 10 . Now my question is if I build it bigger than that is it better or worse

 

[Hondatek]

Bigger isn't necessarily better when it comes to algae scrubbers. Also the bigger you go the trickier it gets to light it.

 

[Godfrey]

Thanks for the input. Bouncing back and forth on either scrubber or fuge

 

[Terrance]

Read the basics of algae scrubbers by turbo floyd. Its a long read, but its worth your time. If it takes you too much time to build one, then buy one of his algae scrubbers

 

[Floyd R Turbo]

http://www.aquariumadvice.com/forums/f20/algae-scrubber-basics-163817.html

Start on post #33 that is the latest update. Screen size is no longer based on tank volume, but rather on feeding.

My current recommendations is a hybrid of both, in a manner. #1 size based on feeding, but #2 also account for tank turnover rate across screen.

Not sure what the "rule of thumb" really is here, but I think at least 1 turn/hour over the screen is a bare minimum, and probably along the lines of 4/hour is good to shoot for. So for an 80 gallon tank you want 4x80 = 320 GPH over the screen, but that means a 9" wide screen (35 GPH/in of width) and unless you're feeding a lot, like 4 cubes/day which would be 4x 12 = 48 sq in, 9" wide means 5" tall, that's an odd size.

So instead maybe shoot for 2-3x turnover rate, which would be a 6" screen (210 GPH) and then the height per feeding, so 6x4 - 2 cubes, 6x6 = 3 cubes.

The 'turnover rate' is really something that I extrapolated from the extreme cases. Say you're feeding a 400g tank 2 cubes/day. Well a 6" wide x 4" tall screen would cover that based on the feeding guideline only, but it takes 2 hours to turn over the tank water. Over the long run, you're giving the algae in the tank more time to absorb nutrients instead of the scrubber being able to take care of it. In such a case you would likely want to opt for a wider scrubber, even though it throws off the cube/day rating a bit.

I don't know if I have now thoroughly confused you or not.

BTW terrance thanks for the plug

 

[Godfrey]

Actually makes a lot of sense and very informative. Do you run protein skimmers or do you find it's not a necessity and how do you feel about the up flow version! Sorry for so many questions but I've just started reading about Scrubbers and they are Very logical for lack of a better word. I want to give my tanks the best I can!

 

[Floyd R Turbo]

I do not run skimmers and the upflow version did not work well for me. I consider it an alternate method that should be considered if you do not have the ability to run a waterfall scrubber. IMO it is still experimental. Some have made it work just fine, others not so much. I think it works well for smaller tanks, but for anything close to 100g or more, I just think the turnover rate affects efficiency somehow, and to get past that, the build gets more complicated and you might as well build a waterfall because the cost/complexity/benefit starts to equalize.