Show off your Turbo's Aquatics Algae Scrubber!

[Turbo's Aquatics]

Growth like this is what I'm referring to, this is from one of my L4 customers

 

[SteadyC]

Scrape yes, scrub now. It's kind of one of those "it depends" answers when it comes to how aggressive you clean the screen while harvesting - if the screen is very mature and when you scrape there is still algae stuck in the holes such that the growth kicks in again pretty quickly after you put it back in use, then you're fine with scraping all the growth off.

But if you're just getting the screen going, or it taking longer to get it to mature, then aggressive scraping will only prolong that. I've seen your vids though, you're fine


I can't see a situation where this would happen - generally when you have one fed off an overflow, the overflow controls the amount of water that gets drawn down out of the tank on an outage. You're describing a situation where you would have a pump in the tank pumping water to the scrubber, then the scrubber drains to the sump, and a return pump bring it back to the tank. That's a "push-pull" situation, and you definitely don't want to do that. Same applies to someone trying to run 2 sumps where the overflow drains into one then pumps to the 2nd then pumps back to the tank. Bad design. But I don't think that's what anyone is talking about here


Yeah I guess you could say I run a 120g AIO!

He doesn’t have a sump, just the filtration in the back, and asked about using a pump to pump water to the ATS under his tank. As a result, a siphon will happen in a power loss. Which as you said, he wouldn’t want to do.

 

[cincyfishguy]

Are the units water tight? Or do the lids just sit on top? I was under the assumption that it was a closed unit.

 

[SteadyC]

Are the units water tight? Or do the lids just sit on top? I was under the assumption that it was a closed unit.

It’s a waterfall ATS design, so gravity feeding water over the screen. In these designs, there is no need to make them water tight, which these aren’t on the top, lid just sits on top.

 

[Turbo's Aquatics]

He doesn’t have a sump, just the filtration in the back, and asked about using a pump to pump water to the ATS under his tank. As a result, a siphon will happen in a power loss. Which as you said, he wouldn’t want to do.

Ok I missed this part of his message I guess:

...I'm curious if I could get one under my stand and pump the water back up into the filter chamber. Any thoughts?

I agree, you don't want to do this

Are the units water tight? Or do the lids just sit on top? I was under the assumption that it was a closed unit.

It's designed with failsafes to prevent overflow so that you can, if necessary, mount it somewhere that is not directly over your sump/tank. I wouldn't call it a "closed system" though. If I"m interpreting your question about the lid correctly, my answer would be that the lid sits on top, but it doesn't create any kind of air-tight seal or vapor-tight seal. That being said, mine sits on top of the corner of my 120 with one end sticking out over the side of the tank and while I've managed to let LARS (lazy *** reefers syndrome) take over to the point where the algae growth was enough to cause the unit to fill up with water above the U-shaped cutout/notch in the growth chamber, I've never seen water escaping from the growth chamber. The slot pipe sits in that U shaped notch, and the bottom of the pipe has a piece of the soft side of velcro on it (for a tight fit and vibration prevention), as it turns out, that velcro works pretty good as a seal of sorts. I've had multiple moments that nearly resulted in downloading in my pants when I went to check the water level in the scrubber, but so far, not a drop on the floor (or even a dribble down the growth chamber)

Knock on wood. Watch, I'll come home today to a pool of water on the floor, and I'd blame that Murphy dude.

 

[b4tn]

Mine seems to grow chaeto exclusivly! Its hard to tell but it gets very dense. Here is about 2 months worth of growth. I know, I slacked off on the cleaning.

The scrubber in my mess of wires. One of these days I can going to re manage everything.

And a full tank shot. I recently had a pretty bad crash (User error) and lost lots of coral but this is how it sits as of now.

 

[SteadyC]

Filtration pic for now, ATS microalgae, chaeto macroalgae, skimmer, dosing pumps, etc.

Here's a growth shot.

 

[mta_morrow]

I'm seriously considering the L2 for my new build. Question......can it be gravity fed from my drain line? if so, what GPM should I aim for and should I split the drain and valve them so that I can control flow through the scrubber.

I probably didn't ask that very well, so please be patient with me!

Thanks, Mike

 

[Turbo's Aquatics]

You can gravity feed from a drain line. There are a few considerations to make:

1) your flow to your DT will be fixed to the flow to your scrubber, so you won't have much room to play if you want to change that rate of return back to the tank

2) Most overflow pipes are open-ended, this way if anything goes down the pipe, it will generally clear out and flow won't be obstructed. If you plumb to the scrubber, this creates a potential clogging point. The worry is not the algae growing up into the slot so much as it is something going down the drain that shouldn't. You can put a strainer on the intake but that's still not a 100% guarantee and also creates another think you have to clean.

3) splitting the flow from the overflow so that you can pump more return to the tank than the scrubber needs is a tough balancing act

To work around #2 (and possibly #1 and #3), ideally you want a full-capacity secondary pipe. So if you had a BeanAnimal 3-pipe system, and plumbed the siphon line to the scrubber, you have a full flow secondary and an emergency standpipe to protect you from the clog-overflow scenario.

what GPM should I aim for

For the L2, you want to shoot for about 200 GPH

 

[mta_morrow]

You can gravity feed from a drain line. There are a few considerations to make:

1) your flow to your DT will be fixed to the flow to your scrubber, so you won't have much room to play if you want to change that rate of return back to the tank

2) Most overflow pipes are open-ended, this way if anything goes down the pipe, it will generally clear out and flow won't be obstructed. If you plumb to the scrubber, this creates a potential clogging point. The worry is not the algae growing up into the slot so much as it is something going down the drain that shouldn't. You can put a strainer on the intake but that's still not a 100% guarantee and also creates another think you have to clean.

3) splitting the flow from the overflow so that you can pump more return to the tank than the scrubber needs is a tough balancing act

To work around #2 (and possibly #1 and #3), ideally you want a full-capacity secondary pipe. So if you had a BeanAnimal 3-pipe system, and plumbed the siphon line to the scrubber, you have a full flow secondary and an emergency standpipe to protect you from the clog-overflow scenario.


For the L2, you want to shoot for about 200 GPH

Thanks so much for the quick response and great explanation Mr Turbo!

I will make it easy on myself and plans for a separate pump.

Thanks again!

 

[SteadyC]

I'm seriously considering the L2 for my new build. Question......can it be gravity fed from my drain line? if so, what GPM should I aim for and should I split the drain and valve them so that I can control flow through the scrubber.

I probably didn't ask that very well, so please be patient with me!

Thanks, Mike

I gravity feed mine from drain line, look at post 70 in this thread. On the very left is my drain line, 3 pieces really. I have a line to the scrubber, then a valve, then a line into the sump. I control the amount of water into the scrubber via the valve. Then, I just eye ball the flow, if I have water covering the whole screen on both sides, that is my minimum, then add a little more as the algae grows thicker, want a little more water. Otherwise, bud has the recommended pump to use, so you know how much flow, based on the rating of that pump.

 

[mta_morrow]

I gravity feed mine from drain line, look at post 70 in this thread. On the very left is my drain line, 3 pieces really. I have a line to the scrubber, then a valve, then a line into the sump. I control the amount of water into the scrubber via the valve. Then, I just eye ball the flow, if I have water covering the whole screen on both sides, that is my minimum, then add a little more as the algae grows thicker, want a little more water. Otherwise, bud has the recommended pump to use, so you know how much flow, based on the rating of that pump.

Thanks SteadyC. That’s what I want to do. I’m a believer in gravity is free and works.
I will think this over. I may hit you up with a couple questions later.

Thanks again.

 

[mta_morrow]

Does an algae scrubber help to reduce both nitrates and phosphates?

 

[atoll]

Does an algae scrubber help to reduce both nitrates and phosphates?

Yes but in most cases much better at reducing nitrate than phosphate although a correctly sized one will keep both in check .

 

[mta_morrow]

Yes but in most cases much better at reducing nitrate than phosphate although a correctly sized one will keep both in check .

Thanks atoll. I appreciate the response

 

[mta_morrow]

So my new tank is supposed to arrive this week. It will be a couple more weeks till water goes in. When should a scrubber be fired up? During cycle? After cycle?

 

[Turbo's Aquatics]

Anytime really, but during cycling it won't have much to work with so for one of my units, you would dial the intensity way down. The goal being just to get something (anything) growing so that when it's needed, it will fire up fast. You would likely not even do anything more than rinse off the screen every week.

 

[mta_morrow]

Anytime really, but during cycling it won't have much to work with so for one of my units, you would dial the intensity way down. The goal being just to get something (anything) growing so that when it's needed, it will fire up fast. You would likely not even do anything more than rinse off the screen every week.

Thanks so much for the quick reply!

What’s the current lead time for an L2?

 

[Turbo's Aquatics]

It's a few months at this point, shooting you a message

 

[b4tn]

It’s hard to tell from the pic but here is each side of the screen. The algae is abroximatley 1/4” thick maybe more. 16 hours of light at the 3 o’clock position. I scraped off what was there in a downward motion. Some spots ripped off with cement. But some spots stayed. Should I decrease light, or add more time? I increased light last cleaning cycle approximately 2 weeks ago.