siphon

[-drew-]

I recently stumbled across your forum and think it's amazing. A pre-made scrubber would be great. I am trying to figure out how to make an external one for my 55 gallon reef, but I'm struggling a little with the location of the scrubber because there is a small window and a picture above the tank and having a scrubber blocking either of the two would not sit well with my girlfriend. Also the tank is not drilled and the stand has drawers compared to the typical open cabinet with doors. So, I am wondering if there is a way to build a scrubber that uses a siphon for the intake and a pump to return the water to the display? Or would that be too much of a hassle to try and find an equal medium?

[SantaMonica]

Siphon's are tricky. I can't give any more advice on them however.

[-drew-]

Then it would be smarter to just stick with the pump as the intake to the scrubber and allow the return to freely flow into the tank to supply the largest amount of pods for the corals. In that case would I be able to use both natural sunlight and CFL bulbs? My idea is to put the scrubber in an enclosed acrylic case and place on a window cill with one side against the window and the other facing into the room with the CFL bulbs. Would there be any side effects from the differnt lighting or would it allow for a greater diversity of algae?

[SantaMonica]

Solar powered scrubbers work great, if the sun is shining directly on the screen.