My Santa Monica - Algae Acrylic Scrubber 100

[kerry]

WOW, You have great looking tanks and quality craftsmanship in your work. Congratulations on a job well done. Are you still using the RO/DI filter for your FW tanks? I have a 200 GPD unit for my SW water but do not use the full filter for my FW. I tap into the line with a TEE fitting just after the first three mechanical sediment filters. I feel that FW fish need the minerals that are in the water naturally so this is why I do not use the final product of the filter for my FW. I am planning a scrubber build this weekend or next (if I do not have time) for my 150G FW tank. It has 6 Jack Dempsey fish and a plecostomus so it builds 40-80 PPM nitrate in a week. I do two 40% water changes per week just to keep it at 20PPM. So I am hoping a scrubber will work just as good on this FW build as it has on my SW. Next build will be my 125G with three Oscars that I also do twice a week as well. The last build will be a 75G African tank that I just do one huge 70% change per week.

[michalm]

OK, Now I know from where I got Silicate. I go to my City Water Department and they show me this:

Silica (SiO2) - from 1750 to 2580 UG/L !!!!

That mean, even I was using RO/DI system silicate was too high to eliminate it at all from my tank.

(((

[kerry]

I would think the silica would be used up if you can get way from changing water. Start the tank with ro/di and the scrubber from day one. Use dead shrimp instead of live fish or corals to get the scrubber and tank established. I would assume the silica will get used up by the algae in a short time as long as you DO NOT DO ANY WATER CHANGES. Just keep enough dead peeled shrimp in the tank to keep the nitrate up to a readable level. Maybe a coupe a week or so? Maybe Santa Monica will have a better solution.

[SantaMonica]

I looked at our water report and it does not list silicates.

[kerry]

I thought algae used silicate?? Is this correct? If so, just keeping the tank up and going with dead shrimp or similar with a scrubber would eventually eliminate the silicate if water changes were not ever performed, right? Wrong?

[SantaMonica]

No, algae in scrubbers do not use silicates.