Micro and nano bubble tank treatment

Squamosa

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Hi everyone.

I recently started reading up on the methods and results obtained by Cruz Arias on generating micro-nano-bubbles to "deep-clean" and inject new vigour into reef tank systems. I have been trying this method and there have been some interesting results.

Basically the method is very simple, pump air through a wooden airstone,to create micro bubbles and then use the cavitation and head pressure of your return pump to "shrink" these bubbles down to an even smaller (nano) size, where they blow like fog into your DT through the return lines.

Nano-bubbles are typically 1-50 um in diameter,negatively charged and move in a haphazard fashion through the water column for long periods of time through Brownian motion.

The bubbles are said to remove detritus and algae from your rocks, sand and glass, clean up diatoms and cyano, increase the ORP of the water and raise the pH by driving off CO2.
They are also said to penetrate the pores of your corals, removing unwanted mucus, sebum and bacteria.
Oxygen is claimed to be delivered more effectively into the coral, fish and invertebrate membranes.
Fish are also said to have more vigour, display continuous grazing behaviour and show improved colouration!

I have bubbled every night (12 hours) for the last 5 days and have noticed the following:

The first 2 nights of bubbling produced large amounts of mucous from the Acropora, but stopped after that. Corals are displaying increase PE, appear brighter in colour and I've noticed some budding on a few species.

Water is much clearer, sand and rock work are noticeably cleaner!

Water has a fresh ocean smell to it

Fish are very active and graze constantly!

Any other reefers tried this method and achieved noticeable results out there?
I'd be keen to read about your experiences :)

Cheers, Tony
 
Interesting. How exactly are we creating micro bubbles?
 
Ive been doing this sporadicly over the past week weeks, not every night, but about once a week or so.
I notice that at first all of the Acropora immediatly shed a thick layer of mucus, and have also noticed the ocean smell the next morning.
I notice a bigger effect on the LPS who seem to either shed off alot more mucus than the acros, or they just take longer to do it.

Other than that i havnt noticed too much of a difference.
 
Interesting. How exactly are we creating micro bubbles?
Simply put an airstone in your sump next to your return pump so that the return pump chops up the tiny bubbles even more as it sends them into your display tank
 
IMG_20160125_214656083.jpg
I have some coral bubbled for fifteen years, a euphyllid. It gets the spa treatment

If long term feedback testing helps, we have some. The fringing reef is a high bubble zone in nature as well, I also like the way they look. Few do...but no real alternative in the airstone driven reef tank
 
Last edited:
An update.

I have cut down my nightly bubbling to 5 hours (12-5 AM).

Fish are far more active, foraging constantly!

Water still has that clean and fresh ocean smell in the morning!

Acropora sp. are budding out now and previous growth tips are showing tremendous growth. Some frags (A. millipora that just sat and encrusted, are now budding).
Corals show clear, bright and rich colours!

Just my observations :)
 
Kind of an old tread now but after reading Mike Paletta's new build plus Elegant Corals FB page I had to give it a try. After a few days I decided I didn't want to "invade" my two tanks every night with micro bubbles and then had a thought as to why this may work, could it simply be the additional surface aggregation to increase oxygen levels? I decided to just add an air stone to my sump(s) and purely "anecdotal evidence" (which means I have no clue) suggest that there may be something to this? Thoughts?
 
Interesting stuff.
Do you need a pressure-rated pump for this to be successful? And are you supposed to constrict the return's output to increase the water pressure within the line to shrink the bubbles?
As far as the bubble production, could you use a skimmer pump? Or would the bubbles be too large?
@Squamosa , why did you cut back on the time? Do you have a way to monitor your ORP? Have you noticed a difference if so?
 
Here's my setup: 1 El Cheapo air pump. I stole the one that came with the kids old 1 gallon Walmart hexagon tank.
1 Lees wooden air diffuser
I run the pump off my apex for 8 hours a night, started with 10. The diffuser is directly under the intake to my return pump.
The bubbles are suuuuuppppper tiny in the display, and this will fill the tank with bubbles. Tank is 96x24x24. I started this 3 weeks ago and I've never had nitrates as low as I do now, and I've been useing red sea no-pox for several months. Everything seems really happy.
 
Interesting stuff.
Do you need a pressure-rated pump for this to be successful? And are you supposed to constrict the return's output to increase the water pressure within the line to shrink the bubbles?
As far as the bubble production, could you use a skimmer pump? Or would the bubbles be too large?
@Squamosa , why did you cut back on the time? Do you have a way to monitor your ORP? Have you noticed a difference if so?
I use a 3.5 psi air pump driving a limewood block. Bubbles are supposedly shrunk by the cavitation of the impeller and head pressure of the water.

Skimmer pump could work too,but you may create cavitation in your return pump if you feed the air in that way and you would get lots of larger bubbles too (as well as very small ones). Salt creep may also be an issue.

I have not monitored my ORP, but a probe is on the way, so I can start, because I'm curious as to the changes (if any).
I'll let people know if there are differences :)
 
Do you run a pressure rated pump?
And I'm guessing that not all of the bubbles produced by the air stone are pulled in by the pump?
 

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