Introducing the new Turbo Algae Scrubber! (Rev 4)

[Pny]

Your algea scrubber looks very professional and well thought in general, but since you strive for perfekt, I'm a bit surpriced that you let the emergency outlet take up so much space lengthwise. I estimate that it is about 1/4 of the length of the scrubber... My sump area is always crowded with equipment, so space is always a concern. Have you considered a more space-efficient design by for example implement the emergency outlet lengthwise on both sides of the scrubber, utilizing the space under the lights, instead of having it in one end? (Please note that this is not meant as critisism to your design).

 

[Turbo's Aquatics]

Turbo, can you please put me on the waiting list for one?

I sure can!

What size system is this new a algae scrubber rated for? My system is about 225 gallons

Generally speaking, scrubbers are sized according to how much you feed: 12 sq in of screen, lit on both sides, for every cube of food you feed per day, or the equivalent thereof. That will get you into the ballpark of what you need, but that's really more of a rough generalization, the effectiveness and capacity of an Algae Scrubber has a lot to do with how it is constructed. For example, if you have a huge screen but really small lights, and then capacity would be limited by the lighting because there's only so much algal production you can get per unit of light energy.

Another factor related to construction is how the algae grows. An open-air screen can grow thick, but the water continuously sheets off and keeps the mat compressed. With my designs (all of them) I have incorporated a False Bottom which serves a couple of purposes: 1) it helps prevent the algae from getting into direct contact with the drain and clogging it (overflow protection technique) 2) it allows the algae to spread out horizontally (called 3D Growth) as it grows thicker (longer). The second factor is the main one that relates to capacity. What happens is that as your algae mat grows thicker, the mat will partially trap water and it will start to "pile up" - the algae growth becomes "trapped" in the space, and starts to grow in a 3-dimensional manner. The best way to illustrate this is with pictures.

These first 2 are an old L2 that I run (stand-alone filtration) on a 144 Miracles Rimless tank in an office. This version (one of the first 6 I made actually) has the side drain up high (too high, and I ended up lowering it shortly thereafter). The side drain on this particular unit never sees flow.

These next few are of the old L2 I run (stand alone) on my personal sumpless 120, which is a top-of-tank scrubber and it had a drainage issue. It's hard to control bubbles with a top-of-tank scrubber, because you have to restrict the drain so much that the water piles up might more easily (and the 1" side drain via Uniseal doesn't cut it well, I've made mods so it drains better, but it still fills up by day 7 and I have to back off the flow)

Here's after I modded it to allow for a bit more flow, meh. Still fills up and side drain (which is on the right side) flow better, which means, algae grows faster in that area. Can't win!! Or maybe, I am winning. Because, growth.

^^ the same screen in open air would be no where near this thick, the growth might be long & hanging off the screen, but would be away from the light..

Some other factors are the current conditions of your system (high nutrients, dirty/old rock, algae problems, etc) and the other filtration you have on the system. No other filtration system is sized according to feeding, so this make it a bit tricky to nail down what you need.

For instance, let's say that on your 225g you run a skimmer, GFO, and carbon, and feed 3-4 cubes/day. An L2 would do well in this system and act as co-filtration alongside the skimmer. Since algae adsorbs nitrate and phosphate, you could likely (once the screen is matured) lessen your dependence on GFO, essentially using the scrubber as the primary means of export, and then run GFO according to your tank needs (if you need it rock bottom 0.00, then you would probably keep the GFO reactor but run much less).

If you were wanting to run the Algae Scrubber as the primary filtration and then maybe run a smaller skimmer, then the L4 might be a better choice: but the L2 has proven to be a pretty good workhorse, 2 cubes/day is just it's guaranteed filtration capacity with the lights running 10-12 hours/day at around 50-70% intensity on the LEDs - I've had people push it past that with a longer and more intense photoperiod.

Also, what will the price on this system be?

It's in the OP, quoted below.

The L2 size of the new Turbo Algae Scrubber product line should be available in December and the current plan (SUBJECT TO CHANGE) is that it will be initially priced at $399 - that's the price of my previous version.

Still waiting on some figures from the injection molding company. It took a bit longer to get them the final models done because of the amount of detail that I had to work through on the part designs - it ended up being a lot more complex, especially the o-ring gland design. There are a lot of tolerances at play as well.

What do you reccomend flow wise for the L2 and L4

35 GPH per inch of screen width is the number to shoot for, but you can start out with lower flow. That is after head loss (flow actually delivered to the screen) which I calculate at 36", this allows for 12" of vertical head + 24" of head loss from the slot pipe. I did some bench testing to compare a 1" diameter slot pipe to a 3/4" diameter one, and the difference was negligible. The additional head loss factor probably has more to do with the diameter of the feed tubing and the 90 degree elbow than it does with backpressure from the slot pipe (which is not much).

L2 = 210 GPH
L4 = 420 GPH

Your algea scrubber looks very professional and well thought in general, but since you strive for perfekt, I'm a bit surpriced that you let the emergency outlet take up so much space lengthwise. I estimate that it is about 1/4 of the length of the scrubber... My sump area is always crowded with equipment, so space is always a concern. Have you considered a more space-efficient design by for example implement the emergency outlet lengthwise on both sides of the scrubber, utilizing the space under the lights, instead of having it in one end? (Please note that this is not meant as critisism to your design).

I think I understand what you are saying (center both the drains). When I was going through all the possible design layouts, I had to consider many things, and one of the top ones was safety, and by that I mean, overflow protection. The first 2 versions were pretty good, but I still had users who managed to overflow their units if they left them to grow for too long without checking (LARS = Lazy you-know-what Reefer Syndrome hahaha). I thought I had nailed it with Rev 3 when I went to drains that were, I thought, plenty large. But, someone still was able to prove me wrong (Super LARS).

If I moved the emergency drain so that it was actually underneath the lights, it would be difficult to route the water to it or disengage the Growth Chamber from the Base for cleaning. If I moved it so that it was right next to the main drain, that would defeat the purpose as it is meant to be a full-volume alternate drain, so it can't be a reduced size (or at least, not significantly reduced)

In addition to this, the Emergency Drain is also meant for use as an "open channel" for anyone familiar with the BeanAnimal Silent and Failsafe Overflow method: you place a valve on the main drain, and then tune it to the inflow so that it acts as a full siphon, with a small trickle going through the OC. In this case it's more like a Herbie but BA is where I started, I never ran a Herbie. With respect to the Algae Scrubber, placing a tuning valve on the main drain has a couple of effects: 1) it silences the drain, 2) it allows for a much higher flow rate (air occluding a drain line will significantly reduce the flow) 3) no air to the drain means no microbubbles on the drain outflow (or at least, a very significant reduction, once the screen has growth). So you couldn't take advantage of this operation with both drains extending out from directly below the screen, unless there was some kind of complex internal routing system to get the E-Drain from the edge of the screen to below the screen. That could probably be accomplished, but you would have to sacrifice vertical compactness and add some difficult to create drain parts, as that kind of layout could not be done with a single-part injection process. Probably could 3D print something that would do the trick, but to maintain full-flow capacity, that's going to take up a lot of space inside the Growth Chamber.

In my previous version, I had the E-drain on the side, down low, with either a Uniseal and a street elbow (Rev 1 & 2) or a threaded adapter + street elbow (Rev 3). These also take up space lengthwise, so the overall footprint of the drain layout actually is more compact with the Rev 4 design: Rev 3 L2 total length from the edge of elbow to other end of scrubber is roughly 12.5", while the total length of the Rev 4 L2 Base is about 10.75".

For the Rev 4 L2, the distance between the 2 outer edges of the drain extensions on the Base is approximately 7.25". Adding for fittings, you're looking at only needing an 8" long (by 3" wide) opening in your sump for the drains. The L4 would need about 11" x 3" slot for drain routing.

So going back to the E-Drain function and the "piling up" of the water, having the drain off to the side (or at least, the initial routing of the water off to the side) of the main growth area is IMO necessary in order to allow for the 3D growth chamber to work properly. The change I made with the Rev 4 is to have a small divider wall to keep the water flowing around the false bottom and down the main drain, which will still "trap" the water in the area underneath the footprint of the screen. I haven't completely decided on the height of that divider, but I'm of the opinion that it should be short so that the end user isn't locked into having to use a high divider, if that doesn't work for them. I plan to make divider wall extensions which will snap over the fixed divider for users that want the water to "pile up" higher and get more 3D growth. For commercial users (services that visit on a bi-weekly basis) you would probably not want to run a high divider. The reason being is that while the path for the E-Drain is still there, if your divider is too high and influent water flow from the slot pipe is even across the length, the water that enters the chamber at the opposite end from the E-Drain has further to travel to the E-Drain, so the water level will be higher there. If you have LARS, this is where you can get into trouble. So don't have LARS, and you'll do just fine.

 

[Turbo's Aquatics]

I haven't recorded an updated video with the new LED boards installed on heat sink with the dimming knob working, etc, but here is a video I made when I got the first set of boards. It's kind of long and I drone on about a bunch of boring stuff so just watch it if you are bored and need help falling asleep or something


Then if that didn't do it, watch this one where I show running the boards in 50% (paralleled arrays) and 100%


Here's me packing up a scrubber in time lapse


Here's me roughing up a screen in time lapse. This part really sucks, especially when you have to do 10 screens in one shot, but this may be a thing of that past now


This is a snoozer, a 23+ minute video on the Rev 3 (the previous version). Man, I just drone on and on! I made a mental note after making this video to not wear a black shirt while trying to show a product that is also black.

 

[jason2459]

I'm already on the L8 wait list and can't wait. I'm loving the Turbo L3 I currently have. So, the TBD = Totally Below a Dollar I assume.

 

[Turbo's Aquatics]

TBD = Totally Below a Dollar I assume.

HAHAHA no.

 

[Zaffor]

I would like to be on your list, i had been looking at your prior model vs an up-flow.
Thanks

 

[Zaffor]

Duplicate post

 

[Zaffor]

Seems like you make it easier to maintain every time you make a new revision. Easy cleaning is a must!!

 

[Blueseatex]

I would like to get on wait list for L2

 

[Turbo's Aquatics]

I would like to be on your list, i had been looking at your prior model vs an up-flow.
Thanks

I would like to get on wait list for L2

I've got you both down!

Seems like you make it easier to maintain every time you make a new revision. Easy cleaning is a must!!

Easier cleaning was one of the things I wanted to incorporate with this version. The removable Growth Chamber will make it really easy to maintain and keep the unit clean long-term. Not that long-term cleanliness was a major issue, I've gone well over a year without a full breakdown and cleaning (soaking with vinegar, etc)...but for those with "big hands" the Rev 2 & 3 versions were a little tough to access (to remove false bottom) and keep clean. That's one instance where the Rev 1 worked a bit better. I got a few comments from the big-hand folks on that one.

 

[domination2580]

What are the sizes? Prices?

 

[Turbo's Aquatics]

L2 (2 cube/day guaranteed filtration capacity): $399
L4 (4 cube/day): $549
L8 (8 cube/day): TBD

Looks like the L8 will likely be in the range of $850-$900

FYI I'm going to see if I can have these 2 threads about the product merged together, looking back on it, there was no reason to separate them...

 

[ethridge78]

Cant wait for the new one.

 

[kattz]

I'd like to get on the list for an L4, please. We're selling and moving between two houses, so later is better than earlier...

Kevin

 

[Turbo's Aquatics]

@kattz I'll put you down, it will be later - this spring is the general timeframe I'm shooting for

 

[pl2002]

I am trying to bring back my 180 gallon tank (fish mainly with some soft corals before) after it was destroyed by Sandy! I now have only one fish for the past 3 years, a 10 year old purple tang that miracously survived after 12 days without electricity. None of the corals survived, so I just have about 100 lbs of Fiji live rock besides the tang, and less than an inch of coral sand.
I want to start re-stocking with large angels again, replacing the ones that I lost. Perhaps up to 6, 4 to 6 inch ones over the next 12 months. What size Turbo should I get? I am completely new to the Algae scrubber technology. I now have a AquaC EV-180 skimmer as the main filtration. Do I still need the skimmer or even a better skimmer after adding one of your scrubber? Finally, please add me to the waiting list. Thanks!!!

 

[Turbo's Aquatics]

If you're going to go with big tangs and lots of them, I would go big: L4, and keep the skimmer. You might be able to start out with an L2 and then bump up in size later as the tank grows. @pl2002 I'll add you to the list!

 

[Black Pearl]

Place me on the list for a rev4 L4. Spring of 2016 just perfect
Thank you Sir

 

[Turbo's Aquatics]

@Black Pearl will do!

 

[Turbo's Aquatics]

FYI for anyone paying attention, I had the "Wait List" thread merged into this one (the "announcement" thread) because it didn't really make sense to have both...confusing. Thanks @revhtree!

Now they're all in one place!