Do rollermats help keep nitrate/phosphate down?

Oregon Grown Reef

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The title says it all. I know it sounds ridiculous. "Of course it does. It removes a majority of the waste before it has a chance to break down."

I guess I'm asking this: What has been the difference in your nutrients before and after installing a rollermat?

I installed a Clarisea SK5000 on my 40 breeder because I was lazy and never changed my filter socks every 2-3 days like you're supposed to. After installing, I've noticed it pulling out a ton of gunk. The water is now crystal clear after just 48 hours. I've read a ton of threads praising them for their filtering abilities, but none to my knowledge that speak to the difference in nitrate/phosphate.

I'd love to hear about your experiences. Hopefully this thread helps convince people to buy (or not buy) a rollermat.
 

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The title says it all. I know it sounds ridiculous. "Of course it does. It removes a majority of the waste before it has a chance to break down."

I guess I'm asking this: What has been the difference in your nutrients before and after installing a rollermat?

I installed a Clarisea SK5000 on my 40 breeder because I was lazy and never changed my filter socks every 2-3 days like you're supposed to. After installing, I've noticed it pulling out a ton of gunk. The water is now crystal clear after just 48 hours. I've read a ton of threads praising them for their filtering abilities, but none to my knowledge that speak to the difference in nitrate/phosphate.

I'd love to hear about your experiences. Hopefully this thread helps convince people to buy (or not buy) a rollermat.
What was your nitrates and phospates before and after?
 
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I've only been using the rollermat for 2 days. This is a newer tank. I haven't tested either yet, hence why I'm asking.
 

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Not used one myself but a reefing buddy has and found it to not make all that much difference to his nitrate levels. He’s anti social media, so not on the reef boards but I can ask him again if anything’s changed. Our ‘provisional’ conclusion was that too much detritus never makes it to the filter, and that that does is already mineralized.
 
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Not used one myself but a reefing buddy has and found it to not make all that much difference to his nitrate levels. He’s anti social media, so not on the reef boards but I can ask him again if anything’s changed. Our ‘provisional’ conclusion was that too much detritus never makes it to the filter, and that that does is already mineralized.
Does he have sand in the tank? I guess I should have added this, but another question would be if you have a barebottom tank or not. The tank I have the rollermat on is a barebottom with 2 Nero 5 on the bottom blowing down the long side. Most of the detritus is blown down the overflow. I designed my scape so that the pumps would have unobstructed flow to each end. I guess I'll start by taking nitrate/phosphate readings after my water change tomorrow and testing after a few weeks of use. I feed heavily, so I'd expect it to normally increase quite a bit.
 

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I've only been using the rollermat for 2 days. This is a newer tank. I haven't tested either yet, hence why I'm asking.
Okay I run one on a bare bottom. But it is very difficult to establish cause and effect between a roller mat and nutrients so I am going to refrain from saying anything. There are many other things that impact nutrients so not easy.
 

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We have many customers that run roller matts and they struggle to keeping nitrate and phosphate in their tank. They seem to do a killer job cleaning the system!
 

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I would look at roller mats as a way of automating the change of filter socks. So if you see any reduction in nutrients with changing filter socks then maybe you will with roller mats. But its not a magical solution for low nutrients.
 
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We have many customers that run roller matts and they struggle to keeping nitrate and phosphate in their tank. They seem to do a killer job cleaning the system!
Hmmm. I feed pretty heavily. I was thinking of running this tank different than my others by using the roller mat and carbon dosing to manage nutrients. I'll have to do some testing here soon to see if that's even needed.
 

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Okay. Here's a few random questions from someone considering a roller mat.

I was given to understand that roller mats work on a principal that when the water level in the unit rises a certain amount due to accumulation of whatever in the filter mat, the roller turns to add fresh filter media and remove the "clogged" media. Is this correct?

If so, how much time is the mat in the water? Is one section exposed to the water for a day, an hour? Does it depend on the nutrient import/export? Will one system go through more media than another?

From what I've seen, it looks like there could be a certain amount of unfiltered water that can get around the mat. Is this something to consider?
 
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Okay. Here's a few random questions from someone considering a roller mat.

I was given to understand that roller mats work on a principal that when the water level in the unit rises a certain amount due to accumulation of whatever in the filter mat, the roller turns to add fresh filter media and remove the "clogged" media. Is this correct?

If so, how much time is the mat in the water? Is one section exposed to the water for a day, an hour? Does it depend on the nutrient import/export? Will one system go through more media than another?

From what I've seen, it looks like there could be a certain amount of unfiltered water that can get around the mat. Is this something to consider?
I don't believe it's perfect in how much it removes, but I'd say as of right now it removes about 95% of what goes through mine. I don't have the bypass valve open at all, so all of my water pretty much goes through the roll.

For my system, the roll advances pretty often. It only rolls it enough to bring the water level down a few inches in the chamber, so it doesn't take long for it to become clogged again. Say you take an initial 12" of roll. Once it's clogged, it removes the first inch, then every 30-60 minutes, it removes another inch. Over 24-48 hours, you've removed the entire first 12" from the water. This will depend on how much you feed and how often.

I plan on doing a water change today, so I'll be cleaning my sump out. There is a ton of detritus currently sitting in the first chamber. It will be very easy to tell how well it's working once it's all gone. Another thing I'll note is that my skimmer is pulling out a lot less gunk. What was a dark brown soup of nastiness is now tea colored. I'll test my nitrates and phosphates after the water change and post here. I'll retest in a few weeks and post the numbers here.
 
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I would look at roller mats as a way of automating the change of filter socks. So if you see any reduction in nutrients with changing filter socks then maybe you will with roller mats. But its not a magical solution for low nutrients.
I don't like to run my tanks with low nutrients. If this, along with my skimmer, keeps things at 15>Nitrates and 0.1>Phosphates, then I'll be a happy camper.
 

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I don't believe it's perfect in how much it removes, but I'd say as of right now it removes about 95% of what goes through mine. I don't have the bypass valve open at all, so all of my water pretty much goes through the roll.

For my system, the roll advances pretty often. It only rolls it enough to bring the water level down a few inches in the chamber, so it doesn't take long for it to become clogged again. Say you take an initial 12" of roll. Once it's clogged, it removes the first inch, then every 30-60 minutes, it removes another inch. Over 24-48 hours, you've removed the entire first 12" from the water. This will depend on how much you feed and how often.

I plan on doing a water change today, so I'll be cleaning my sump out. There is a ton of detritus currently sitting in the first chamber. It will be very easy to tell how well it's working once it's all gone. Another thing I'll note is that my skimmer is pulling out a lot less gunk. What was a dark brown soup of nastiness is now tea colored. I'll test my nitrates and phosphates after the water change and post here. I'll retest in a few weeks and post the numbers here.
Thanks. Very informative.
 

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Freshwater fish excrete most of their nitrogen as ammonia from the gills. I think saltwater fish are the same but I'm not 100% sure. If you don't have a lot of uneaten food then most nitrogen is going to be coming from the gills and not affected by mechanical filtration.

The Hirayama paper on waste accumulation found that there wasn't much of a relationship between filter flushing interval and nitrate levels:

hirayama nitrate.png


But there were differences in DOC which inhibit growth at levels ~125X lower than nitrate:

2020-08-12 18_10_33-hirayama1988.pdf - Adobe Acrobat Pro DC.png
 

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Brstv did a test using filter socks which is the same mechanical process. With sufficient flow where detritus is in the water column, IIRC they said its something like 40% effective reduction. Likely higher with rollers bx with socks they still keep in tank for 3 days so possible of some rotting that will not be the case with roller
 

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The title says it all. I know it sounds ridiculous. "Of course it does. It removes a majority of the waste before it has a chance to break down."

I guess I'm asking this: What has been the difference in your nutrients before and after installing a rollermat?

I installed a Clarisea SK5000 on my 40 breeder because I was lazy and never changed my filter socks every 2-3 days like you're supposed to. After installing, I've noticed it pulling out a ton of gunk. The water is now crystal clear after just 48 hours. I've read a ton of threads praising them for their filtering abilities, but none to my knowledge that speak to the difference in nitrate/phosphate.

I'd love to hear about your experiences. Hopefully this thread helps convince people to buy (or not buy) a rollermat.
Before rollermat upgrade I was running 30+ no3 and .16-.2 po4 now I am 10 no3 and .06 po4 and I keep adjusting the float to get it to the final nutrients I am looking for. plus not dealing with socks/floss has been amazing :)
 

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Freshwater fish excrete most of their nitrogen as ammonia from the gills. I think saltwater fish are the same but I'm not 100% sure. If you don't have a lot of uneaten food then most nitrogen is going to be coming from the gills and not affected by mechanical filtration.

The Hirayama paper on waste accumulation found that there wasn't much of a relationship between filter flushing interval and nitrate levels:

hirayama nitrate.png


But there were differences in DOC which inhibit growth at levels ~125X lower than nitrate:

2020-08-12 18_10_33-hirayama1988.pdf - Adobe Acrobat Pro DC.png
These data look interesting. Do you have the whole paper?
 
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Oregon Grown Reef

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Before rollermat upgrade I was running 30+ no3 and .16-.2 po4 now I am 10 no3 and .06 po4 and I keep adjusting the float to get it to the final nutrients I am looking for. plus not dealing with socks/floss has been amazing :)
This is amazing! Have you adjusted anything else for nutrient export?
 

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