Phosphate remover for 5 gallon reef

[royy]

After many years out of the game I am setting up a 5 gallon nano tank. Back when I had my 90 reef I used a phosban reactor which allowed me to run skimmerless. I was wondering if the iron based phosphate removers are still the best option. Maybe there are better options for a nano tank. Maybe it would be better to use one of those phosphate pads cut to the size of the overflow chamber since I really don't want to run a reactor off of a fluval spec v. Not sure if those work well since I never used them. Any insight would be appreciated.

Thanks,
Roy

[soulpatch]

2 different things between skimmer and reactor. Skimmer is removing DOCs which do aid in nitrates, phosphates, and such whereas the GFO is specific to phosphates for most part.

GFO in a small reactor will be significantly cheaper to run over the more expensive pads. You can also mix carbon and gfo in the reactor should you wish.

That all said I do not have experience with as small of a tank as yours so take my post with a HUGE grain of salt.

[AZRippster]

Frequent and regular water changes with a quality salt may be enough to control your phosphates.

[soulpatch]

Frequent and regular water changes with a quality salt may be enough to control your phosphates.

Even if you remove 25% of the water you leave behind 75% of the water with high phos which spawns algae. Water changes IME have very low success rates for controlling phos...

[ReefWreak]

If you want to go skimmerless, I can't recommend enough running some macroalgae in the display. I ran my skimmer last night for 12 hours, the first time in about a month, and my tank has been doing great without it. I'll run it every few weeks just to pick up some organics, but for the most part, my tank has been incredibly happy without a skimmer running.

[1MP3R1AL]

In a 5 gallon tank... Wow.

Water changes should be the only thing you could possibly need.

If you had 2 aqualifters, let's say changing 1 gallon of water a day over an hour each day, I'm quite sure you wouldn't have to skim, use GFO, carbon or anything else. Total price? Probably around $50.

[royy13]

I'm not familiar with the aqualifter. I'm going to have to look into that.

[BeachVacationer]

Do you measure phosphate level?