Making a algae scrubber in th back of my 24 cube/nano

[Paul1525]

Ok, I'm new to the site and have a zillion questions, so if I may be so bold.....

I have a 24 gallon tank with two chambers in the back. The left chamber holds the recirculation pump and the right has the overflow. The two are seperated but have two slits that allow water to pass back and forth.

I put my protein skimmer in the far left chamber and cleared the right one to build a "turf scrubber".

Inside of the chamber I put a power head that moves the water across a piece of media. The media hangs from a piece of pvc and is weighed down. The media sits up against the back glass, which I scraped the black paint off of and have added a grow light to shine through.

The light is supposed to be a 3 watt per bulb light (I have 3 lights / total 9 watts).

Haven't grown a lick of algae in 2 weeks.

I scuffed up the media on cement really good too.

Although the media looks "huge" I'm only exposing a small portion to the light for 10 hours per day. The light is about 2 inches from the glass.

Oh... one pinch of food every two or three days for my clown and a barnacle blennie.....

HELP!!!!

Thanks,

Paul

[SantaMonica]

Welcome.

When looking through the back glass, how far down do the bubble go down from the overflow?

[Paul1525]

SantaMonica,
The entire screen is under water. My thoughts on this were as follows:

"Hell, my power heads allways get filled with algae, maybe this would work?"

[Paul1525]

Oh, by-the-way, thanks for the super fast response!!

[SantaMonica]

The screen will only grow where there is air/water turbulence, so that would be only as far down as the bubbles go from the overflow. You could put an airstone or open-ended air tube below it, to increase the turbulence area.

Glad to help

[Paul1525]

So if I add the bubbles, do you think it should work?

[SantaMonica]

Certainly. It's the basis of how our UAS designs work.

[Paul1525]

Awesome!
Do you think that my light is powerful enough?
And secondly, what light would you recommend for this setup?
Again, thanks so much!

[SantaMonica]

If the light is a 9 watt plant-grow LED, it will probably be ok. 18 hours on.