Air bubbles! good? no good?

[johnny505]

I JUST read in an old issue of TFH that you CANNOT have too many air bubbles and water circulation in a reef tank. " They are both crucial in gas exchange" I know circulation is a must, but bubbles???? 90% of my rock is on a PVC shelf....except for the sides and front

[Tim224DT]

I say no to bubbles. What happens when the bubbles reach the surface of the water and pop salt will start to form on your glass top, canopy, or what ever is near your surface.

Tim

[svine]

This is too wierd. I was on way way to make this post on this very subject when I noticed yours. I have thousands on tiny micro bubbles in my tank. These are coming from the return line from the sump. They are not producing any salt creep as they are so small they hardly make in disruption on the surface at all. I also do not keep a top on mine either. I was told by a friend that mine is being produced as the overflow empties water into my sump and the water is cascading down to the bottom traping air and creating these tiny bubbles. They really don't bother me but it might be nice to have a perfectly clear view throughout the tank. Is there anything I can do to reduce this?

Steve

[Little Luey]

You can place something between the outlet to the sump and the return pump so that it disperses the bubbles, like a wall in the sump, if you cannot put a wall place some live rock in the sump, just to obstruct the path a little.

[gman0526]

Do you have a skimmer? If you do then there's your bubbles. As far as having bubbles in the main tank, IME they don't hurt anything at all, you might get some sliming off some corals but nothing major, IME.

FWIW, I inject bubbles at least 3x's a week in my main tank's water column by putting a 1/4" on the return pump's intake. I usually do this when i turkey baste my rocks and I have all that gunk flying through the tank, thus making the tank itself a protein skimmer of sorts. The gunk is rises with bubbles, gets picked up by the overflow and dumped in the skimmer chamber to be exported. This method is advocated by lrdhawke , whom I'm not sure if he posts here or not, the main difference between my application and his is that he actually does it everyday with a pump that's on a timer. The model behind this is trying to "replicate" the effect of waves on a reef, where a lot of bubbles can be seen due to the waves crashing on it. HTH

[svine]

I don't think I can do the wall idea but maybe the rock suggestion might work. Thanks for the tip.....I'll try it out and let you know.

[johnny505]

I wanted to use air bubbles because I still have a light film on the top of my tank, even after I got an overflow box for my skimmer. I was told that my seaclone 100 isnt doing a good job anyway..... in 24 hours I get about 1/4" of a cup... but i only have 3 fish in a 65 with 60lbs of LR for now. I can see tiny white particles floating all over in my tank....