Refugium Reactors

Grant

Premium Member
I'm in the process of building a new sump, due to some design issues with my current?one. ? It?has?the primary drain going to one end of the sump where the skimmer is and the secondary drain going to the other end which was intended to be a refugium. ?The return section is in the middle. ? The problem is that there just isn't anywhere near enough flow in the refugium area. ? I found that if I took the return line from my two media reactors and put it into the refugium that it helped some, but because I had to restrict the flow so much going through the carbon and GFO it still really wasn't enough.A while back I saw an email from one of the big online Reef sellers advertising an LED rope light that could wrap around a reactor and allow it to grow algae. ? I don't really need to run GFO or carbon all the time so I decided to give that idea a try. ? The wall behind my tank is shared with the garage, so my reactors, skimmer overflow, and top off stuff is all out there. ? I cleaned out both reactors and used a simple lamp from Home Depot with a 6500k bulb in it. ? This also let me open up the valves to allow a lot more flow through the system. ? So far it's been working great. ?I ran just one for a while (the other still had carbon in it) and over the weekend I had to cut back the chaeto since it was almost completely filled so I decided to use both for chaeto. ??View attachment 253
 
Good idea! ?I have seen the reactors they sell for this purpose and thought about doing it myself. ?Does that light stay on all the time or reverse daylight? ?Sadly, I don't have the room to do it in my tank.
 
I do, but I need to change that out for the mesh disc that also came with the reactors so that pods, etc, can get back out.
 
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