My scrubber story/questions

[Murph]

Hey guys; great forum and lots of great info. Many thanks to santamonica.

Here is my story and a few questions.

I am currently rehabing a sorely neglected 40 gal breeder tank. Had massive algae growth of all types. Was running sumpless with a HOB skimmer that was not functioning properly and a light fixture with 2 year old T5s. I have moved it to my house and added a 29 gal sump, replaced the bulbs and got the skimmer working(coralife65)and started running some GFO. I also have access to NSW and am using it to do large water changes. Tank is coming back to life nicely. Best indicator is probably the two SPS of unknown species that are going from crap brown to mint green rather quickly.

About four weeks ago I made my first attempt at a scrubber. It is in a Rubbermaid container being fed by the overflow getting approximately 600 GPH. Screen size is 12 by 8 inches. I have cut a hole in the top of the container lid and am resting a 42 watt soft CFL on it for lighting. This means the top of the screen is about three inches from the light and the bottom is about eight. Also means the screen is pretty much one sided.

First couple of weeks I got the black sludge but this past week it has tapered off and I am getting nice bright green of some type (not hair). It is growing at the bottom of the screen also which I feared would be to far from the light source for this to happen. Certainly does not grow as fast as the sludge did. I think I can do better though.

What I would like to do is use a piece of deeply scared acrylic rather than screen. I have spent some time roughing up a piece and this stuff and it is like a cheese grater. Far rougher than I can get any type of screen. I can see myself taking the skin of my fingers cleaning the algae off of it.

Have this placed in the Rubbermaid with the bottom of the acrylic resting on the bottom of the container creating about 25 degree slope from the feed tub to bottom. I don't plan on any holes in the acrylic to let water fall through just a straight sheet of water cascading down the acrylic. Not sure if this is good or bad. The slope will slightly increase the area of the screen but my concern is the bottom of the acrylic being so far from the light source. I could ea easily add another 42 watt bulb to the top however. I noticed with my current set up that algae grows on the bottom of the container just as well as on the screen. Probably due to the light source coming straight down rather than from the side. This is not a problem for me as I just clean out the container the same time I clean the screen.

Ok so let me have it. The good? The bad? The ugly? Will this setup be effective for my size tank?

Almost forgot to ask. In the short time I have run the scrubber I have noticed a significant increase in pods. When I turn on the lights in the morning there are all over the front glass (which by the way has needed vary little scraping since starting up my scrubber) Also scads of them all over my overflow box where they are easy to see: white specks against a black overflow box.

Is it possible for my size scrubber/tank to provide enough micro fauna to feed a Mandrin? Keep in mind my scrubber is below the tank but there is no filter media between it and the return.

speaking of scraping the glass. I saw on another forum where one of the ATS nay Sayers stated that with a top of the line skimmer and filtration that there would never be enough nutrients in the tank for a ATS to grow. I bet ya a million bucks that despite this top of the line skimmer and filter this nay sayer had to still scrape the algae off his front glass at least once a week. Now if there is enough nutrients for algae growth on the front glass there is enough nutrients to run a scrubber; right?. Some peoples logic is hard to follow at best.

[Floyd R Turbo]

I would stick to the plastic canvas personally, rough that up and then if you want to support it so that it is slanted, put the piece of acrylic underneath it.

You want 2700-3500K lighting, I don't think the soft white CFL is right. You want warm white. Double check that.

With the light close at the top of the screen and far away at the bottom, and slanted, you're going to be limited. You really want the light source perpendicular to the screen, and with a reflector. Light intensity decreases with distance according to the inverse square law. The algae at the bottom of the screen is getting less than 1/4 of the light as the top of the screen.

As for the pods, yes you will get millions from a scrubber, and plenty to support a mandarin.

I know people who run both a scrubber and a skimmer. They do 2 different things, one does what you want, the other does exactly the opposite of what you want, but they tell you it does what you want. Now if you're running GFO and carbon, or bio-pellets, then you might have a problem growing a scrubber. But that's a different issue. It is true that you can achieve high water quality without a scrubber, but you need many pieces of equipment to do it.

[Murph]

Ok I will double check on the bulb. It is this one if you have an opinion on it

http://www.doitbest.com/Compact+Floures ... 518746.dib

I guess I could try to rig up some lighting to the side but I would much rather just add another bulb shining down from the top if that would make any difference.

AS for the plastic canvas I cant see getting it as rough as my piece of acrylic. Take a blow torch to a piece for a few second and then rake across it with a whole saw then dip in water and you will see what I mean. It is rougher than a ten shot tequila hangover.

Good to hear on the Manderin. I had one in a 120 gal system some years back and it was my favorite fish. I would be content for it to be the only fish in my 40 gal which would eliminate any food competition also.

[Floyd R Turbo]

Anything rough enough will do. Your description seems like it would work very well for a one-sided screen, if you didn't care about flow-through. In your case you actually don't want it, because you want the water to travel down to the bottom of the screen. I'm sure SM will chime in with his 2c.

I've got a scooter blenny and I think he does just fine. When I moved the tank last week, there were mysis shrimp all over the place.