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Unread 07/05/2008, 08:11 AM   #4
SantaMonica
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Join Date: Feb 2007
Location: Santa Monica, California, USA
Posts: 2,511
Well from my understanding of turf filters, the reason the algea grows in the filter and not in the tank is that you use algea-friendly lighting in the filter (5000K or so, i.e., more red, just like in a fuge), but mostly it's because of the large amount of air that is available. That's why in the ocean you see turf algea grow at the air-water interface (on pylings, rocks) only where the waves crash. I believe the huge amount of air is what makes turf so much better of a nutrient uptake than other macros; the CO2 must be limiting in other macros (they're all underwater in a fuge), but in a turf filter of any kind you have continuous air-water-air-water alteranations. So CO2 no longer is limiting, and thus the turf is free to take up more N and P. Not to mention, of all the accounts I read about people previously using turf filters, almost none got turf in their disply. Some even replaced their skimmer entirely.

As to the bulkiness, yes there are two lights instead of one, but the concept is that since there is light on both sides, you can make the entire unit half of what would normally be required. Most of the units I read about were 3 to 4 feet long horizontal bucket-type units that were a foot thick, or 3 feet tall wheel units that were 1.5 feet thick, both of which were too bulky (and impossible to get) for my 100 gal. At the recommended one-square-inch-screen-per-gal, my screen only needs to be 10 inches square, maybe less if you account for lights on both sides. So the acrylic box only needs to be about a foot high and 2 inches thick. If you just use a standard pc light from a nano (about 2 inches thick), the entire unit becomes just a foot high and 6 inches thick. This can sit right on a sump, instead of having to have it's own room


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