Algae scrubber

[Money pit]

Ok so having been out of the hobby for a few years, there's quite a bit that I've forgotten. I decided to spend a good part of the long weekend refreshing my memory, and learning whats new in the last few years. I checked over at Marine Depot to catch up on both Calfo and Bornemans forums. Sad to see they are both closed now, but at least they are still available to read. Anyone know if these guys are still active somewhere on the internet ?
While I was there I came across this huge 95 page thread on algae scrubbers.

http://forum.marinedepot.com/Topic89570-4-1.aspx

Some very interesting stuff. Apparently this is thread #2. #1 was started on RC.
The real reason for this post was to see if anyone here has given one of these a try, and if so how it worked out for them. Seems very basic and simple.

[tinman]

I have heard about these............very interesting!

[bryceschutte]

There was just a thread started on this topic a few days ago.

http://www.canreef.com/vbulletin/showthread.php?t=74796

[Money pit]

Originally Posted by bryceschutte

There was just a thread started on this topic a few days ago.

http://www.canreef.com/vbulletin/showthread.php?t=74796

Strange, I did a search here for algae scrubber the other day, but nothing came up. Must have miss spelled it.

[cathyg_99]

ya that was me who stared it... i would love to try it out but i just dont have the room at the moment and dont want to pull all my sump apart to get a light in there... if anyone on canreef has it let me know if it helped thanks

[granitereef]

I plan on building one in the next couple of weeks.
I will keep you posted

[Bill]

I tried this last year. Phosphates went from 1-2ppm to zero and nitrates went from 20ppm down to 5-10ppm. This took about 3-4months.

It works, but needed lots of carbon to keep water from turning green and cloudy. Needed weekly cleaning and algae falls off the screen when it gets too thick. Can try double screen to help it attach better. I used a plastic screen from Walmart $1.60 ea and 2-23W coil CFL soft white for $6 for pack of 2 from Save on Foods.

Lots more info on algaescrubber dot net

[GMGQ]

Since you are getting back into the hobby, you may also want to look at Biopellets as well for reducing Nitrates and Phosphates. Much easier to setup than an algae scrubber, with pretty much zero maintenance for months at a time.

I started running them since January 2011 (when I had a tank overtaken by hair algae), and I have 0 Nitrates and 0 Phosphates at this point. I have not had to replenish the biopellets yet in these 4 months.

[imcosmokramer]

has anyone here used one long-term?

[Money pit]

Bill, apparently at least from what I've read, as long as you remove the screen from the tank when you clean it, and clean every 7 days, the tank wont get green. Were you doing this and still getting green water? Mind you with a mixed reef, I'd be running carbon anyways.

GMGQ, yes I've looked at bioballs, at the moment I'm using prodibio, its working OK with 15% water changes. About as well as my old tank with 50% water changes as far as keeping NO3 down. If I got my calculator out I believe 50% water changes were cheaper. Being a more natural remedy along with the low cost is what catches my interest in the algae scrubbers. Provided of course they work.
My NO3 test kit kind of sucks, since the color of the dye is purple and the color chart is pink its difficult to tell what the reading is, but judging by the density of the color it looks like under 5 ppm NO3 using prodibio, so its working, but at $60 every 3 weeks it seems a bit expensive. My tank is a 40g with 30g sump, so I need to use as much as a 250g tank. If I went with Bio balls, I would have to by a reactor, as the only one I have now is running carbon. Or do the bio balls also polish the water?