Working out screen size

[Ericsson]

I'm looking into setting up a scrubber but I'm pretty clueless.

I feed roughly 1/2 cube a day, so I'm looking as a 1 sided screen, but what size does it need to be? How to I work it out? And then how do I work out the wattage? The sizing guidelines didn't help me much.

[Smitty]

From the guidelines:

An example VERTICAL waterfall screen size is 3 X 4 inches = 12 square inches of screen (7.5 X 10 cm = 75 sq cm) with a total of 12 real watts (not equivalent) of fluorescent light for 18 hours a day. If all 12 watts are on one side, it is a 1-sided screen. If 6 watts are on each side, it is a 2-sided screen, but the total is still 12 watts for 18 hours a day. This screen size and wattage should be able to handle the following amounts of daily feeding:

1/2 frozen cube per day (1-sided screen), or

So I would say you would need a 3x4 screen with 12 watts of lighting.

I also feed about 1/2 a frozen cube a day. I ended up with a 4x13" screen but don't have all of it lighted. I just have it long because that was the only way to not have the water splashing down into the sump and still have the lights perpendicular to it. I don't know how well it will work though because it is much longer than recommended.

[Ericsson]

Very small thought it would have been bigger, don't know if this is a good thing or bad. If I upped my feeding to 1 a day would the screen size double assuming I'm lighting one size?

I would need it longer as well as I don't want it splashing and creating too much noise.

Assuming I'm using 3x4 screen I need 35gph so I will need a flow of 420, correct?

[Smitty]

From what I understand, it is 35gph per horizontal inch. If it is 3" wide and 4" tall (3x4) then it would be 3x35gph = 105 gph. It is really hard (IMO) to get something like that exact. I just made sure it is a nice steady flow down the entire width of the screen.

Just remember, I'm just starting out on the whole ATS thing. I'm just spitting up what I've read. I hope some with much more experience will chime in.

[bguile]

Smitty, that is correct.

Also, regarding whether you've lit your entire screen or not the flow in light covered area still needs to be 35gph per inch otherwise you've weakened the filter by making it longer if you did not compensate.

[bguile]

Very small thought it would have been bigger, don't know if this is a good thing or bad. If I upped my feeding to 1 a day would the screen size double assuming I'm lighting one size?

I would need it longer as well as I don't want it splashing and creating too much noise.

Assuming I'm using 3x4 screen I need 35gph so I will need a flow of 420, correct?

Yes, you would double the size if you are 1/2 cube more and keeping it single sided. Remember you will also need to raise the flow if you add horizontal inches, and lighting wattage must increase 1w per sq in.

[Ericsson]

How does this setup look, http://i644.photobucket.com/albums/uu169/ericsson89/abfa9362977aaae3920574e20cedbf31.jpg

It's 4x3 with a 4" air stone.

[SantaMonica]

Light?

[Ericsson]

12w cfl spiral with reflector, but how does the bubble flow look?

[SantaMonica]

Ok from what I can tell.