Trying something different. Fluidised golf balls. kaldness.

Well I have 3 scrubbers, on two tanks. An up flow, waterfall, and a drip through, experiment in progress.
I acuired a 75 gallon sump tank, for my lower 75 needs some work still.
My top tank has a internal fluidized sand bio filter. An up flow scrubber that is 8" × 18". It is powered with one 10 watt purple grow led and a couple 12 volt 10 watt led diy. It is stocked with 1 adult cichlid and 20 growing fry, 1" long today.
My idea is to replace the sand filter with some k1, packed inside a 5 gallon swimming pool sand filter canister. That is ready to tie in to the basement, closed loop, 55 gallon drum,.
Well the main idea is to fill the 5 gallon sand filter with. Plastic practice golf balls. With 660nm gem lights wired inside via a bulk head fitting. And air injection
Well in theory they will be self cleaning. All the fluff would be picked up in filter floss on top on the tank.
I put some well sanded balls in the catch basin in my waterfall scrubber. To see How well it works.
Just looking for any body's ideas and 2 cents. Thanks.

The drip Thur scrubbers light failed, a month ago, water ingress. Since is has been my tester of wimpy leds, and a lesson on LED wiring 101. The current ones seam hopeful. If the transformer holds.

Attachment 6890 a 50 Gph pump keeps them in turbulence.
Attachment 6891 The golf balls.

I don't golf, but aren't those balls solid and not porous ?

They are indoor, practice golf balls, like a ping pong ball.

I don't think they are going to help, You need porous insides, which give lots of surface area.

Attachment 6893
It's a start.

Yes algae will attach, if rough. But bacteria have very little surface area.

I am not attempting to house any bacteria, only algea.
The turbulent area below the scrubber. Where the golf balls are, has algea growing in a thick clumps. So much that the balls becomes stalled out. It's time to harvest.

Attachment 6971
Algae covered ball, It seems to work. After a few days the balls jam up from thick algae.
Any algae that grows stays in the chamber and builds into a floating glob.
Ideally I think more turbulence to cause the balls to self clean with a overflow leading into a course filter. This sump set up is too small to experiment much. I have a 75 gallon sump to modify, I will definitely have a turbulence section were the over flow enters the sump. Followed by filters.
I also have some very seriously touph fresh water turf algae growing, That if took root, would never be self cleaning.

Attachment 6972
Turf Algae, growing under cfl. On the right is what started accidently. The left side is being cultivated.

Green experiments :)

Attachment 7298
Newly modified 75g sump

Where are the balls

Attachment 7299
Just started them today in the newly siliconed 75 g sump. They were in the water below my waterfall scrubber on my green tank.
Got a few more pumps, and wave makers to play with coming in the mail.
It is going to be a work in progress over the winter...

Looking to find a way to keep it calm enouph for daphnia, yet strong enough to be self cleaning. The tank has 8 baffled chambers, that are 100% self cleaning, with the suction tubes. So I might hold the first chamber as a refuge, then bump the scrubber down one.

Attachment 7317
So far everything, has been going well. With a few minor tweaks, mostly to keep the balls from plugging the overflow tube.

Attachment 7318
Top view,

Attachment 7348

It's been operating 5 days, on scrubber filtration only. Feeding a tsp of 40% protein cichlid pellets.

Attachment 7349
13 balls total with 10 660nm leds, at 20 to 30 watts.
The balls are about 8 square inches each. The chamber is about 8" x8" by 18" deep. With all 4 sides covered in algea also.

It has about 20 medium African Cichlid.

So far the balls, have been self cleaning, with the added benefit of feeding cichlid fry, free floating algea.

I will probably add more fish, more food, until I get ammonia registering.

Then swap out an up flow screen, and see what it will so. With the scrubber being the only "bio media in the tank".

Then I might just line all 4 sides with upflow scrubber screens, add 4 bubble wands, and roll. With a 8"x18" x4 single sided cubed UFS. Then let the balls scour off algea from the screens.

Until, after I find out how much ammonia It will absorb per square inch.

Cichlid fry are doing well on algae?

They grow out a little slower, but they do well on it.

Attachment 7381
Added some more ball, a while ago.
Ammonia is holding around, .50ppm, on the API liquid test. Ph 7.5 so according charts, the ammonia vs total ammonium is safe. I had to learn about it myself
Did a first water change a week ago, nitrates were around 30ppm.
Have about 20 .75" fry in the tank also, I guess they are less tolerant to ammonia than adults, canary in the coal mine.

I filter sock about twice a week, then pull and clean sock, as to keep the bacteria multiplying, and messing with the science project.

The seachem ammonia alerts are all in the safe,
Feeding about 1tsp a day, probable 6 tsp week, as I miss sometimes.

Waiting for the other balls to green up. Using 10, 3watt 660nm leds. Air stone, and a wave maker.

Maybe you don't mean 0.5 ppm ammonia... would be bad.

I did not like .5ppm ammonia either. Just needed more algea growing. Last water test Friday. Had ZERO ammonia.
With nitrates. Less than 20 ppm.

Attachment 7384
Showing some potential, time will tell.

The fluidised algea Scrubber, has completely, used all the ammonia, preventing it from becoming nitrate.
So after 2 weeks, nitrates are unchanged. I have increased the lights to 20 three watt 660nm leds, and two 10 watt 660nm cobs. All the lights are submerged. In effect it is a 4 sided box, of 8" x 20" scrubbers, with the fluidised balls continuously, harvesting algea.
The algea gets passed through 5 compartments of fish, fry were the loose algea can get consumed. The flow then passed through a filter sock.

Good job. And auto feeder too.

Thanks for all your help. I really appreciate it.