Algae issues? Why dont more people use algae scrubbers?

VintageReefer

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If I built my own skimmer and it leaked and did a poor job at skimming, do I have justification going in a skimmer thread telling everyone skimmers suck, They don’t work, I know cause I built my own and it was hard to use and messy
 
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ScubaSkeets

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I do however find your attacks on members DIY versions, very distasteful.
This is starting to become comical

Can you point me to where any of his posts could even be SLIGHTLY misconstrued as an attack against people's DIY versions because I must have missed them.

The only people who have "attacked" are a select few. (I'm sure you know who they are)
Heck, even I'm guilty of it but mine was reactionary. I didn't draw the first punch
 

Doctorgori

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This is starting to become comical

Can you point me to where any of his posts could even be SLIGHTLY misconstrued as an attack against people's DIY versions because I must have missed them.

The only people who have "attacked" are a select few. (I'm sure you know who they are)
Heck, even I'm guilty of it but mine was reactionary. I didn't draw the first punch
@ScubaSkeets …ya know I’ve labeled you a troublemaker; you started this thread ( can’t believe I waded through most of this thread lol) :beaming-face-with-smiling-eyes:
 

Garf

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so your failed design / attempt means what?
If I built my own skimmer and it leaked and did a poor job at skimming, do I have justification going in a skimmer thread telling everyone skimmers suck, They don’t work, I know cause I built my own and it was hard to use and messy
This is starting to become comical

Can you point me to where any of his posts could even be SLIGHTLY misconstrued as an attack against people's DIY versions because I must have missed them.

The only people who have "attacked" are a select few. (I'm sure you know who they are)
Heck, even I'm guilty of it but mine was reactionary. I didn't draw the first punch
Not paying attention again?
 

TommyH70

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BOTH.

I perused some of your threads. Looks like you already posted about this. Glad you are happy with your results.
When people post about algae issues, most suggestions are to get a clean-up crew (two orders from reefcleaners didn't help me), manual removal (easier said than done and it's not going to remove all of the algae plus it'll probably just grow back), or chemicals (I tried Vibrant and it didn't work, and who really wants to add chemicals anyway?), or a blackout (two blackouts temporarily worked for me, but I doubt my fish/corals enjoyed them very much and waiting those 3 days without really knowing whats going on kinda sucked) There are other suggestions but I think these are the top ones.
Enter an algae scrubber. I put a DIY algae scrubber in my sump about 2 months ago, and my tank is virtually algae free with no signs of it reappearing. My nutrients are good (Nitrates @ 1.0-2.5; Phosphates @ 0.05-0.08). I have a heavily stocked tank and I keep my fish well fed.
It seems that most people that have an algae scrubber swear by them, so why are they not used more?
Is it the cost? Store bought ones are a huge expense, especially not seeing the results with your own eyes. My DIY scrubber probably cost less than $80 and it is probably the best the best thing I have done with my tank
I would live to see pics of both!
 

Dburr1014

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If I built my own skimmer and it leaked and did a poor job at skimming, do I have justification going in a skimmer thread telling everyone skimmers suck, They don’t work, I know cause I built my own and it was hard to use and messy

- This has been proven wrong both mathematically and in real life. Without using “absolute words” the agreement from both sides seems to be “yes you can reduce or nearly eliminate hair algae in a display, but a display will always want to grow some form of algae”


“But seriously, just because you run an algae scrubber it doesn't mean algae will not grow in your tank. It's impossible to pick and choose where algae is going to grow. The scrubber may help or it may not. It's just one more tool in a toolbox full of tools.”
- agree to disagree. Agree you can’t tell it where to grow. But you can certainly tip the scales to a extremely high degree. Multiple people here achieving >90% algae removal from a display after adding a scrubber


“I tried one years ago that I DIY'd. Complete failure and messy is all get out. I'll stick to my refugium.

- so your failed design / attempt means what? They are all messy or ineffective? Not sure the logic here. If I made my own <anything> and it came out a failure, or was difficult to use properly, then maybe I would consider buying a premade one from one of the multiple vendors who spent years and years working on their product, making it efficient and user friendly and selling it to the public
I was simply sharing my attempts to try in the world of scrubbers. Nowhere did I say that they just don't work, if you read back to my thread I simply said I will stick to my refugium.
So your skimmer comment I feel was directed at what I said about making a scrubber and has no use or value in this thread.

What do you mean it's been proven mathematically that algae won't grow in a specific spot because you have a scrubber somewhere else? Can I see scientific reasoning behind that? My comment was simply saying that because you have a scrubber doesn't mean that algae will not grow somewhere else on a rock. And if you don't agree with that then we will just have to agree to disagree but the laws of physics are on my side.

After reading through all these pages I feel that you will never change your mind on your beliefs. It goes to the old saying "a man convinced against his will is of the same opinion still."
It doesn't matter what I say, it doesn't matter with anybody says you will still believe what you believe.
This Thread is pretty much dead.
I hope you have a Happy New Year.
 

VintageReefer

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Not paying attention again?
Delusional thoughts from fantasy island

The poster stated himself it was a failure:

“ I tried one years ago that I DIY'd. Complete failure and messy is all get out. I'll stick to my refugium.”

So I asked how his failure at a diy is relevant. Not an attack at all
 

Reefering1

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Ugghhhhh.... this is still going? I can't imagine anything constructive left for anyone to add. Going in circles now. Like a dog chasing its tail about to drown in the pool. May as well make like a good argument and start bickering about unrelated topics. Example to choose from; leds suck, global warming is fake, and bill gates designed covid...
And go!!
 

VintageReefer

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Ugghhhhh.... this is still going? I can't imagine anything constructive left for anyone to add. Going in circles now. Like a dog chasing its tail about to drown in the pool. May as well make like a good argument and start bickering about unrelated topics. Example to choose from; leds suck, global warming is fake, and bill gates designed covid...
And go!!

Yea I guess I got frustrated. Now we’re going in circles.

We actually got past all this stuff and came to agreements and the convo turned productive. And random posts just want to go back to the discussions we all had 10 pages ago and start them over as if they didn’t happen
 

mizimmer90

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What do you mean it's been proven mathematically that algae won't grow in a specific spot because you have a scrubber somewhere else? Can I see scientific reasoning behind that? My comment was simply saying that because you have a scrubber doesn't mean that algae will not grow somewhere else on a rock. And if you don't agree with that then we will just have to agree to disagree but the laws of physics are on my side.

An early part of this discussion was focused around this concept. My proof is on page 20 (linked below) but is buried in this massively growing thread lol. I'm staying out of any personal discussion other than the fact being that algae grown at one location CAN reduce algae grown at another. I think we have all agreed on this but are now discussing the details of how it's implemented in real systems

Get ready for excitement! I'll demonstrate the power of a good model!

To alleviate confusion around this, I decided to model the effect of a refugium/ATS and prove that growing algae in one location will have an effect on the amount of algae grown at a different location (and even has the ability to make it go to 0).

Consider the following setup of a display tank and a refugium/ATS with volumes of V0 and V1, respectively.

diagram.png


The Nutrients (N) in the tank are considered "well mixed", which means that the concentration is instantaneously equilibrated, and local effects are not considered, i.e. algae in the display has access to the identical nutrients in the refugium/ATS and vice versa. p0 and p1 are intrinsic rates of nutrient intake per unit volume for the display tank algae and fuge/ATS algae, respectively (these values are different because of lighting power/spectrum differences, etc. but could also be more general to measure of other factors too).

With this setup, we can model a set of differential equations that describes the change in nutrients in the water column, as well as nutrients that accumulate in algae from the display tank or fuge/ATS.

latex_setup.png


Here, N(t) is the amount of nutrients in the water column, A0 is the amount of algae in the display, and A1 is the amount of algae in the refugium (both A0 and A1 are in units of nutrients). We can also model a constant influx of nutrients to the tank (i.e. through feeding). In this model, I assume no outflow of nutrients, so the sum of N, A0, and A1 is always increasing by c*t.

Solving these differential equations for N, A0, and A1 yields the following:

latex_derivation.png


Now the neat thing about this is that the growth of algae in the display is proportional to the ratio of intrinsic growth of the display and its volume by the total algal growth (p0V0 / (p0V0 + p1V1)). If we take this to the limits and have a significantly larger Fuge/ATS than the display tank, we can see the algae growth in the display tank goes to zero!

asymp_lim.png


This is a proof that your model is wrong! Algae grown in one side of the tank *DOES* influence algae grown at another, and a sufficiently large fuge/ATS *CAN* completely outcompete algae in the display.

So, finishing our discussion: if a fuge/ATS doesn't work, it's NOT because algae grown at one location can't compete with another location.

Backing up though, how many of us have a fuge/ATS that's larger than our tank?? I doubt many! So what might these curves look like in practice? Well, I computed the nutrient/algae growth as a function of time from the above derivations and there's some informative data!

First, imagine we have a fuge the same size at the display, with identical lighting power/spectrum. Both A0 and A1 curves are the same (green and red respectively, though green is completely overlapped by red in this plot; free nutrients as black curve) and the ratio of algae in the display and in the fuge is 1 (seems reasonable!). BTW, code is in python and available on request!

Screenshot from 2023-12-19 00-54-32.png

Next, convincing ourselves that it's possible for a mega sized fuge (100x the display with a comparative advantage of 10x!) to completely out compete the display tank. A0/A1 ratio is 0.001(this value actually just ends up being the ratio of (P0V0)/(P1V1) so I'm dropping it from subsequent plots.
Screenshot from 2023-12-19 00-57-58.png


Okay, I know you're saying this isn't realistic! So what about a fuge that's half the size of the display (still a big fuge) with lights that give a 10x advantage (this is a guess but we can throw this parameter around). Doesn't look too bad! definitely helps, but this model predicts significant algae still growing in the display (green curve).

Screenshot from 2023-12-19 01-02-24.png


What about a significantly smaller ATS (5% of tank volume) with bigger advantages (50x comparative advantage to display)? Similar split.

Screenshot from 2023-12-19 01-06-35.png


What if we have an underpowered fuge/ATS? lets say same size as above but only a 10x advantage to the display?
Screenshot from 2023-12-19 01-08-27.png

Now the algae in the display starts to win! Though its important to notice that the display algae is still much lower than it would be without the fuge/ATS.

Now, I wouldn't read into exact values (a little arbitrary), but this shows how we can tune the knobs of our system and how it will influence the tank!

Summarizing the whole discussion, this model is actually *consistent* with a lot of what you say and actually serves to validate your experience. It's clear that in some circumstances, an ATS and fuge is not "all you need" (though to be fair I'm not sure anyone has actually ever said that in this thread lol).

It is consistent that even with an ATS, you and others can still see algae in your display tanks. However, it is clear that an ATS can work, but might need to be supplemented with some other practices that add to the comparative advantage, like... herbivores!

The big difference, and the reason I've been persistent is that your explanation of "why" just didn't hold water (pun intended lol).

I hope you have a great Tuesday! :)
 

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Ugghhhhh.... this is still going? I can't imagine anything constructive left for anyone to add. Going in circles now. Like a dog chasing its tail about to drown in the pool. May as well make like a good argument and start bickering about unrelated topics. Example to choose from; leds suck, global warming is fake, and bill gates designed covid...
And go!!
I’ll have a go, lol. This documents that algal growth rates are nearly maxed out at natural seawater levels, presumably undetectable by us with our test kits. So lowering them but remaining still detectable would have no effect; if folks look hard enough they will probably find research that states the opposite;

 

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Ford is better than Chevy, GM, and Dodge combined.
Lol. Ford circled their problem in the center of their grille. At least jeep gives you a nice seat(the front bumper) to sit while you wait for the tow truck
 

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Troylee

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I spend zero time growing algae. It just grows by itself in my scrubber. Once every 2 weeks I spend 30 seconds to grab a handful of algae and throw it away.

What do you do to maintain those numbers? I bet it’s more time than I spend on my tank
I maintain 5ppm no3 and .02 po4 with carbon dosing on a doser… I spend 60 seconds every 4 months filling my doser container with bacto balance lol..
 
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ScubaSkeets

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Ford is better than Chevy, GM, and Dodge combined.
You have NO idea what you're talking about! Ford trucks don't even work!
Ram trucks are the only solution!! **

** In case someone doesnt realize this is just a joke, it is. I like Fords too!!
 
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