Tunze Macro Algae Reactor - Cheato spin

[BetteMidler]

Hey, I almost lost all my cheato ball, but it seems to be getting better after a month of struggle. The chamber was completely full two months ago, but now it's receded or melted to what you see. There was a massive Caulerpa explosion in the display, but that also receded or melted. The melting also started about two months ago. I managed to pull most of it out of the display. The tank is a 40-gallon breeder filtered by a canister that feeds a UV, then this Tunze 3181 reactor. The reactor feeds the display, and it's full of pods running around.

As of now, not getting any nitrates on my salifert test.

I was thinking about cleaning the reactor this weekend, but now that the cheato is starting to come back, should I just leave it alone until it grows & fills the chamber back up? What do you think?

 

[aquascaping2reefing]

Hey, I almost lost all my cheato ball, but it seems to be getting better after a month of struggle. The chamber was completely full two months ago, but now it's receded or melted to what you see. There was a massive Caulerpa explosion in the display, but that also receded or melted. The melting also started about two months ago. I managed to pull most of it out of the display. The tank is a 40-gallon breeder filtered by a canister that feeds a UV, then this Tunze 3181 reactor. The reactor feeds the display, and it's full of pods running around.

As of now, not getting any nitrates on my salifert test.

I was thinking about cleaning the reactor this weekend, but now that the cheato is starting to come back, should I just leave it alone until it grows & fills the chamber back up? What do you think?

I just set up something almost identical. So your running the reactor inline without the pump that comes with it right? Do you think that the cheato is spinning to fast? My subject matter expert friend in the hobby was saying it's spinning way too fast being inline with my oasie canister filter. However it seems like you got growth, at least for a time? I thought about adding a coupler and slowing the pressure in the can at least a little bit maybe, however I don't want to break the pump in the canister. Still trying to think of other ways to possibly slow it down. May I also ask how long you run the light on the reactor?

 

[BetteMidler]

I am not using the pump from the algae reactor, the canister filter pump drives my entire system. It's flow rate is less than 300gph. Made sure by measuring it with a 5 gallon bucket when I 1st setup the tank over a year ago. The spin doesn't matter, once the cheato grows, it stops spinning. The reactors light is on an opposite schedule from the tank and it runs for 9 hours.

I've only pruned my Cheato twice in a year when the entire chamber fills with a thick mat of cheato. My system had only a single fish and a CUC. Recently, I added a second fish. Very low bioload. I was going to prune the cheato about two months ago. It filled the chamber, but never thickened up. It has reduced to what you see now. Apparently, it is quite common for these reactors to act this way. Too efficient, pulling all the nutrients out of not enough to feed the algae. I'm about to try & save what little Cheato I got left and move it to my quarantine tank. Get my bioload up by added more fish & add a ball of Cheato back. My nitrates have been 0 & even though I have doubled my feeding for over a month. The tank is just too efficient.

 

[aquascaping2reefing]

Got it, thanks for sharing. Will see what happens and if it grows. I have a healthy bio load due to having a bunch of nems, fish and cuc in the tank. I probably need to take out the GFO I have in the filter now and maybe add a few more fish, but it's delicate balance with the nems. Glad to know the flow at 300gph wasn't to much, my oase 850 biomaster does about 400gph so it shouldn't be that much faster. Thank you.