[SantaMonica]

Good points. And I'm like you... have not tried one yet. Nevertheless...

Two spraybars: I also just thought about a spraybar for both sides; this would make the screen removal super easy... just lift it up between them. Although even with a single spraybar, if the flow were enough, I would think it would hit all parts of the screen. You could even make the drain hole small so that the box would almost fill up every time.

Icky cleaning: Well, compared to a skimmer (dead waste stuff), I figured the turf algea would at least be alive. So even though if it smells like algea, I did not think it would be as bad as a skimmer. Also, you only harvest once every 7-10 days, so at least the frequency is less.

Chaeto bucket: It's neat that you got all your macro filtering into a 5 gal bucket. I tried chaeto last year and it disolved away, but then I did not turn my skimmer off.

Tint: I do believe that turf and other macros (chaeto, etc) use the same photosynthesis process, and it's this process that puts the chlorophyll into the water. Maybe the reason turfs have been associated with tinting is because their processing is so much faster (because of the large amount of CO2 from the air) that for the same amount of algea, the turfs are processing much more N and P, and thus releasing more chlorophyll. I would think chaeto and the others also tint the water, but at a much lower rate because of their slower process (less CO2 available in the water). So, maybe, all macros tint the water the same amount for a given amount of N and P processing, but turfs can do it in a much smaller space, or in a much quicker time.