New to scrubber

[Fishuntbike]

I just finished my scrubber today and now running, pictures to follow. Right now I run it to my 40 breeder and my scrubber size is 10 x 8 with single light for now but I will put the other one tomorrow. The flow is about 40 gph and the light is 23 watts spiral at 2700k . Since I installed it now should I turn my skimmer off and my phosban reactor containing phosguard?also I have a refugium in the sump, should I take it out too? I like the idea of scrubber and it's a win win situation in the long run. I need your guidance.... Thank you all

[Fishuntbike]

here are the pictures of my scrubber. I still have to move the light a little closer and move the screen away from the divider. Right now I still have the skimmer running on first chamber of the sump and the refugium at the 3rd chamber of the sump while the return section is in the middle.Once I removed the skimmer and fuge, I will move my scrubber to it's final spot and be able to give more flow to it. That spot will be in the first chamber of my sump and water flow is coming from one of my overflows, flow will pass the 3 bubble traps and I will combine the fuge and the return section as one big return chamber. What do you think guys? Thanks for any suggestions.

[SantaMonica]

Yes move the bulbs closer. And you can use 33 watt bulbs instead for more power if you want.

You can remove the other items whenever you want.

[Fishuntbike]

Thank you SantaMonica, I will start removing things this weekend.

[Fishuntbike]

To all pls comment if my specs are not right on...thanks. I have a temporary ATS for now and I will be building my permanent one this spring.

Just to confirm my specs again for my 40 gallon DT Reef.
Screen size = 8" wide x 10" long roughed plastic canvass
Light = 2 x 23 watts 2700 K (which I will change to 33 watts 2700 K or 3000 K later) lights to be 3 inches away or closer?
Overflow drain pipe size = 1" (will this give me atleast 460gph?)
Light Timer = 18 hrs on , 6 hrs off
Cleaning time = 3-4 days for now until all green to 7 days

[SantaMonica]

Looks good except clean 7 days.

[Fishuntbike]

That is great .....thanks again SM, I cannot wait to build this baby in the next month or two

[Fishuntbike]

Finally got my hand to build the scrubber box I wanted. Screen size is 9" wide x 8" high for my 40 gallon breeder and the box size is 12" deep, 14" wide and 9" tall. My bulbs are 30 watts 27K and water is supplied from my overflow.

[Fishuntbike]

more pictures, flow is coming from my Fail Safe Silent overflow from RC member Beananimal design

[Fishuntbike]

inside ATS, bulbs are about 3 inches from the screen and the screen box allow flooding inside about 1+ inches of water, the whole box is dry where the reflector and bulb are located.When servicing, I disconnect from a union valve and remove the screen box with the screen.

[SantaMonica]

Is going to work well.

[Floyd R Turbo]

Hey when you get it fired up let me know. I want to do a beananimal overflow on my new 120 w/scrubber and have been posting to see if anyone else has tried it. SM uses a Herbie and says it works fine. I was worried that the full siphon standpipe wouldn't purge fully. I was thinking that I would use a larger than suggested open standpipe (maybe 1.75" instead of 1.5") to allow the siphon to run full but allow for slowdown towards the end of the week before cleaning. However that may not be necessary but I don't know, not many have been providing me feedback (or didn't look at my posts). I won't be starting my build for at least 4 months so I've got time to plan it out and work all the kinks out. Let me know how well yours works please!!

[Fishuntbike]

I've been using this overflow (without ATS) for 2 years now and I don't see any difference in flow with the ATS installed. I got so much flow going on there even just using 1" pipe and it is quiet for my 40 breeder. I recommend to go atleast 1.25 pipe to 1.5 to make it much quieter but bigger that that is not neccessary. I have 3 overflows and 2 of the overflows are kept dry (as failsafe) so that i can get the most from the main overflow at full siphon. To tell you how is the flow right now, I don't even have my main overflow valve to fully open (15% less) due to water is being drained so quickly from my weir.I have to grind to lower lower the lip of my weir so that water fill the weir quickly to compensate the main overflow drain speed. You'll have no problem with this set-up. Hope this help
I will take pictures to show you how mine is

[Floyd R Turbo]

Awesome.

As for having to grind your weir down, why would you have to do that? Lowering the weir wouldn't increase the flow rate over the weir, it would just lower the top of tank water level. The flow rate over the weir is dictated by your return pump. If you want to get more flow so that you can open your siphon standpipe valve fully, you would need to increase your return pump flow rate by getting a bigger pump or increasing your return piping diameter. For instance, if you're running a Danner Mag pump, you need 1.5" minimum return pipe (regardless of pump nozzle output size)

It sounds like you have it working almost right. You're supposed to have it the way you're running it from what I understand, you partially close the full siphon valve so that it's operating at full siphon and you get laminar flow down the open channel standpipe. You have it tuned right to the edge of operation, with no flow down the open channel. I think this is not recommended because if there's any change in water level - lets say you stick your arm in the tank, then take it out, causing a momentary drop in tank level - then you would break the siphon. You should close your siphon standpipe valve a bit so that it's operating at less than full capacity and you get water running down the open channel but not enough to cause it to gurgle

Or am I missing something that you were describing?

[SantaMonica]

A tuned full-siphon is somewhat self-adjusting. If you put your arm in, the water level goes up, increasing presure on the siphon, and thus the siphon will flow more. If you put two arms in, it will probably start going down the emergency.

[Fishuntbike]

the lip of my overflow box is totally flat, giving it a little angle in the mid-section will make the water to rush in to the weir without dropping my tank level. When this overflow is tuned properly just like SM said it is somewhat self adjusting and putting hand to the tank will raise your water level and siphon will not break but instead it will flow more. I use 3 street elbow, the one turned down is full siphon while the 2 that are up are emergency. For the full siphon I shorten the elbow to accomodate higher water in the box.

[Floyd R Turbo]

I think both of you missed what I was getting at.


lets say you stick your arm in the tank, then take it out, causing a momentary drop in tank level - then you would break the siphon

Yes I understand that putting your arm in the tank will cause more water to get displaced over the weir. My point is that if your full siphon is running at 100% and the open channel standpipe at 0% (no flow in it) then if you pull your arm out of the tank, the flow could momentarily stop over the weir and your siphon could potentially break. Not like it's the end of the world, your siphon would just have to re-start. But this is why you do not want your full siphon standpipe running at 100%.

The point of the 3-pipe "silent" system is to have the full siphon pipe running at less than 100% of the total flow, and have the open standpipe taking up the slack, enough so that the water is coating the inside of the pipe but not so much that it causes coverage across the entire cross section anywhere in the pipe (which would cause the gurgle).

If you grind down your weir, like you described, this would not change the situation, it would only raise the level of water in your sump and lower the level of water in your DT, assuming that the volume of water did not change before and after. You will have exactly the same amount of water falling over the weir because the rate of flow over the weir is dictated by the flow of the return pump. It will just flow a little more over the angled mid-section, which will concentrate your surface skimming to that area, effectively decreasing the effectiveness of the weir because of the decreased effective width.

I follow your logic, but I think you're looking at it the wrong way. So don't take all this the wrong way, I'm not trying to get on your case or anything like that, I'm just trying to save you some time!!

I'm glad you put up that picture though, because it helps me understand the situation. What do you mean by "For the full siphon I shorten the elbow to accommodate higher water in the box."?

Also, it doesn't look like you have an open-channel standpipe in your design, you have 2 emergencies. Which is fine, but you might lose the intended functionality of the open-channel standpipe. Having 2 emergencies will probably do the job about the same. But if you turn one of the up-turned elbows slightly sideways, and then close your siphon ball valve a teeny bit, you will have some water flowing down 1 emergency pipe, and the full siphon should hold in the event that you put your arms in the tank and then remove them.

[Fishuntbike]

I see what you are saying about momentary loss siphon when removing from the tank but it is so quick though to flood the box and return siphon and that is not my concern.In regards to the 3 street elbow with 1 turned down and 2 are emergency, I did that because I use the main full siphon for the ATS so that I have all the water flowing to the ATS instead of going to the other pipe. Without the ATS I have that set-up which beananimal design is utilized, but with the ATS my concern is to get all the flow I can get from it. I mentioned that I cut the the street elbow (which is the one turned down) by doing that the water in the box went a little higher allowing me to open the valve a bit. Regarding the grinding of the lip of the box I am still debating if that will help, and I follow what you said and you are probably right on that. I have another bigger pump that I'll try this weekend, will see. Goodluck to your coming build

[Floyd R Turbo]

I get what you are getting at w/r to getting the full siphon going 100% to the ATS. It's one of my concerns with the BA system. The way you solve it is to drill the hole for the open standpipe about 1/4" higher than the full siphon standpipe. I've seen that suggested several times to solve people's issues with getting the FS started quicker.

When you say that you cut the street elbow, do you mean that you shaved off the part of the elbow that extends downward toward the bottom of the box so that it does not come as close to the bottom of the box? How did that allow the water level in the box to raise?

[Fishuntbike]

I believed the 1/4 hole beibg suggested is to allow air to come out so that the water will flow on the pipe wall and get 100 % full siphon. Anyways the cut elbow is exactly you said to be not close to the bottom of box, it let the water in box to go up till hit the lip of the elbow and start siphon. I also tried having 3 elbows facing up with different heights making the shortest to full siphon the next short one give a flow to the next pipe and the 3rd as dry. All the testings make a little changed but not much. I think changing bigger pump will suffice every need to ATS

[Floyd R Turbo]

No, what I was saying is that if you wanted to ensure that the siphon standpipe started more reliably, you would drill the hole for the bulkhead for the open-channel standpipe 1/4" higher than the hole for the bulkhead for the siphon standpipe. If you read enough of BA's thread you will see this suggested several times. What I was saying is that you cannot do this, since it's already drilled.

As far as drilling a hole in the siphon standpipe, I think you're referring to drilling one just above the water line in the sump to aid in purging the siphon standpipe during startup.

The reason that your settings probably didn't make a lot of difference is because of the nature of BA's design. You are supposed to have 2 down-turned elbows, and when the siphon kicks in full, it will suck the water level of the box down to below the level of the lowest point of the open-channel (horizontal, inside the bulkhead) because the opening of the elbow is below that level. As long as the water stays far enough above the open end of the siphon elbow, it won't suck air and lose the siphon, and as long as the water doesn't go too high in the box, the open-channel standpipe will only get a little water flowing in it. The point is to tune it so that water just flow down the open-channel.

I think that by cutting the end off the downturned elbow of the siphon standpipe, you may have lost part of the functionality. The siphon now cannot lower the water level in the overflow box as far as it could before, therefore your "tuning range" is decreased. It depends on how much you cut off the siphon elbow. Of course, if you didn't turn the open channel elbow all the way down, maybe just pointed it sideways, you would still have a little tuning range, but it still will never act as a true backup siphon.

[Fishuntbike]

Okay I know what you are saying but it's not applicable to me anymore because it's done already, they are all the same height. I read the whole thread back in 2009 when I was doing my overflow but not lately and probably I will not remember any of those after 2 years. All the experiments I am doing with the stand pipe is because of the ATS and not concern of any functionality of the BA design right now, cutting the elbow allows me to bring the water higher in the box and flooding the box means allowing me to open the valve a little bit for more flow