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Unread 11/13/2017, 01:43 PM   #18
tmz
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Join Date: Apr 2006
Location: West Seneca NY
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The upwelling is water moving with the bubbles . Most skimmers create a significant upward flow . Reef's move water upward via advective flow.
The differentiation between upward flow and foam fractionation was clear in my earlier post. Nonetheless ,a"bit" of unbound material will move in an upward flow and some of that ,probably a small amount will settle in the skimmate, in my view.


This from Randy's article previously cited explains it better:




[B]"...The froth of bubbles begins to drain under gravity, removing much of the water between the bubbles. Some of the bubbles merge into larger bubbles. As long as the bubbles do not pop before significant draining occurs, then the organics will be left behind in the foam, along with some residual water. Eventually, the concentration of organics on the top of the foam becomes great enough that they exceed the solubility limit, and small particulates of organics form. These particulates are generally what a skimmer collects, along with some water and organics that remain present in solution or at the air/water interface...."[B]

So, I don't think all of the material in the skimmate results from molecular attachment at the air water interface ; some albiet arguably a very small amount can be pushed along with the water .


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Last edited by tmz; 11/13/2017 at 01:50 PM.
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