Undergravel Jets????

[witecap4u]

Has anyone tried undergravel jets on a reef tank? All it is, is a pump hooked up to some PVC that runs under the sand, and has outlets that stick up out of the sand. Would there be any disadvantages to doing this in a reef.

The guys on cichlid-forum seem to love this, and it seems like a good way to get flow to the front of the tank, blowing on/toward the rockwork....cs

[phage]

My guess would be that the sand is denser than gravel, so the flow would not be as good. Also, the whole purpose of a DSB is to have anaerobic zones for bacteria to grow and process nitrates. If we have flow going through this sand, there can be no anaerobic areas, and the DSB will just become a really deep nitrate factory and pollute the tank. (I am assuming this is related to an undergravel filter, but only with higher flow?!) Unless I am totally missing the boat on what you are talking about, and I very well could be.

[RedDragon]

ya I think that would get your tank all dirty,with a fine sand bed unless your useing crushed coral as a top layer, but the nitogen gases from your sandbed would be out of wack, but thats just what I think ;)

[witecap4u]

Actually, i think you did miss the boat. :lol:

You run PVC under the sand, and the output sticks up out of the sand maybe an inch or so, and blows upwards. The DSB would still be intact and undisturbed for the most part, it would just have a few PVC pipes running through it. The water would be blown at the reef, not into the sandbed.

cs

[witecap4u]

heres a link for a better discription, and a pic

http://www.cichlid-forum.com/articles/ug_jets.php

[RedDragon]

man thats kinda cool, I would like to try this but cant cuz I dont want to mess up my sand bed by puting in the pvc piping in,

[Nano_Steve]

i think this idea would look incredible with some crushed coral sand instead of fine sand. i just came back from taking my scuba certification at aquarena springs on saturday and there were beds of bubbling sand where warmer water was flowing up from vents below the sand and it looked incredible! i didnt even think to try it in an aquarium, but having them stick out of the sand would accomplish a pretty cool effect too. i think that if you have enough bio media and filtration you shouldnt have to worry about the bacteria stayin in place since the filtration does most of the work.

[phage]

Oh! you're talking about a pseudo closed loop, just burying the returns into the sand?! I see now. Yeah, thats no big deal, hides the pipes some, and basically is what everyone does that has a closed loop drilled through the bottom of their tank. That shouldn't be a problem at all.

[Henry]

I was thinking of doing this same setup. alot of people with large tanks tend to do that. I was going to run a spaybar at the back of the tank, behind my rock and then have jets that run along the bottom front of the tank and face back toward the rock. all this would be on a closed loop system. I'll post a diagram later.

Henry

[Tim Marvin]

It works.

[newtosa]

This is exactly what I'm building this week (new 150 still under construction). I was struggling with how to attach the whole assembly to the back wall, and you gave me a better idea. Thanks.

I still don't think I'm near good enough at aquascaping to actually plan where the jets coming up from out the DSB will be placed (piling rock up is always a frustrating exercise for me), so I'm not going with this idea 100%, but I can use some of it to anchor the PVC rectangle that lives along the back wall of the tank. It's actually more of a circulation ring with drilled holes pointed in planned directions. I've never had much cyanobacteria, but the times I've had it, it's always been on the back wall. We'll fix that.... :twisted:

Dean