Micro Scrubbing Bubbles.

[Cruz_Arias]

1 question more

If we can produce nanobubbles with a cheap wooden air stone - why does we not produce any nanobubbles in our skimmers? The nanobubbles should - if they were produced in the skimmer - been transpoeted out to the DT because they can stand in the water for weeks.

I´m not saying that the bubble scrubbing method not work - because I have not try the method but i doubt that there is nanobubbles involved in the action.

Sincerely Lasse

Hello, Lasse...

The needlewheel thickness is the limiting factor in "needlewheel skimmers". Yes, they are all the same size, uniform, pretty, but still very large...
I believe I addressed this question earlier in the thread... let me grab it...

 

[justjes45]

So... I got the wooden bubblers, air pump and timer. Tried to set it up yesterday and the bubbles from the wood block don't go into my tank. I have a 30 gal Nuvo tank, where the filters, heaters etc are in the back.
I put the bubbler in the center section, all the way at the bottom, and I can't get the tank to suck up he bubbles and blow them into the tank...
Am I putti it in the wrong spot??
Help please!

 

[Gomery12]

So... I got the wooden bubblers, air pump and timer. Tried to set it up yesterday and the bubbles from the wood block don't go into my tank. I have a 30 gal Nuvo tank, where the filters, heaters etc are in the back.
I put the bubbler in the center section, all the way at the bottom, and I can't get the tank to suck up he bubbles and blow them into the tank...
Am I putti it in the wrong spot??
Help please!

You need to place the air stone near the mouth of your return pump so it pulls in the bubbles.

 

[justjes45]

You need to place the air stone near the mouth of your return pump so it pulls in the bubbles.

I tried that, thinking the return is towards the bottom, and it doesn't suck the bubbles up...
Maybe if my hands weren't in the water.
I will try again. Thanks!

 

[Cruz_Arias]

I tried that, thinking the return is towards the bottom, and it doesn't suck the bubbles up...
Maybe if my hands weren't in the water.
I will try again. Thanks!

Make sure there is no sponge in the return pump (strainer area)
This is how they controlled not allowing bubbles into the DT...

 

[Cruz_Arias]

@Lasse @Randy Holmes-Farley @Squamosa

Hello, Lasse...

The needlewheel thickness is the limiting factor in "needlewheel skimmers". Yes, they are all the same size, uniform, pretty, but still very large...
I believe I addressed this question earlier in the thread... let me grab it...

One of the Biggest Differences between microbubbles that we can see, versus nanobubbles, the flicker and refractive fleck or sparkle we occasionally see, is size... And yes... I know they spelled "difference" incorrectly...

Probability dictates if you start off with a smaller bubble to begin with (limewood airstone) then pulverize it some more, then you'll get "occurrence splitting" and "occurrence shearing" maybe, if we're lucky 5 to 10% of the total microbubbles generated.

Coupled with the head pressure in the return pipe (typically a straight run from the pump up to the return nozzles) we get a low pressure compression of the smaller gas bubbles... once again potentially creating an absorbance of the gas into the water column at that point. Thus shrinking most smaller microbubbles and converting them into the negatively (don't know why) charged nano bubbles.

Using a useless presentation laser pointer from the early 90's... we witnessed these "flecks of refraction and reflection" even after we stopped the micro/nanobubbling in the return chamber... and they persisted for days after we shut the bubbler off...

 

[Cruz_Arias]

@Lasse @Squamosa @Randy Holmes-Farley
There were questions about floatation with the use of nanobubbles/microbubbles.

Though the nanobubbles themselves have minimal buoyancy, they still have buoyancy that adds up when grouped together on a piece of detritus.
This has a greater buoyancy and is more efficient at floatation than detritus surrounding an air bubble.

"As bubbles float up to the surface, they catch solids (contaminants) suspended in the liquid and bring them up to the surface. Since suspended solids are not uniform in size and shape, large bubbles often fail to catch and bring them up to the surface. On the other hand, micro/nano bubbles can penetrate into small dents of a contaminant and enclose it entirely in a ball of tiny bubbles, making it buoyant."

■High internal pressure (difference between internal and external pressures: ⊿p)
※Calculated from the Young–Laplace equation (⊿p is in inverse proportion to the radius) and the surface tension of water.
■High solubility of gas
It is suggested that micro bubbles within 50μ naturally disappear (collapse) in the end after repeating the process of gas dissolution (gas dissolves → the bubble shrinks → internal pressure rises → gas dissolves).
■Laminar flows as fluid
Bubbles of uniform spherical shapes rarely create turbulent flows but make laminar flows.
■Lower frictional force
It is suggested that the formation of laminar flows of gas and liquid results in lower frictional force between a solid and liquid.
(Application example: ships)
■Electrically charged micro/nano bubbles
It is suggested that the external surfaces of micro/nano bubbles are negatively charged, and the charging tendency is proportionately greater when pH is greater. Charged bubbles can electrostatically attract contaminants and metal ions"

 

[pondman]

Here's food for thought.if we put so many micro bubbles in the tank what about the fish? Fish breath water not air they get there oxygen from the water if there is so many bubbles of air in the tank makes you wonder how good that is for the fish?

 

[Pife]

It's been discussed.

 

[Cruz_Arias]

Here's food for thought.if we put so many micro bubbles in the tank what about the fish? Fish breath water not air they get there oxygen from the water if there is so many bubbles of air in the tank makes you wonder how good that is for the fish?

Here's the response to understanding bubble size... and density concentration of the bubble aggregation needed.

We're talking nanobubbles.

 

[Lasse]

Hello, Lasse...

The needlewheel thickness is the limiting factor in "needlewheel skimmers". Yes, they are all the same size, uniform, pretty, but still very large...
I believe I addressed this question earlier in the thread... let me grab it...

Until now I have lived convinced that the needle wheel and mesh wheels was developed to provide as small bubbles as possible. This is because small bubbles provide increased foaming
Apparently I was wrong in this because you claim that a wooden air stone and a normal impeller to a return pump provides finer bubbles.

So maybe - the best skimmer construction is to make a box with inlet and outlet. That box should contain a wooden air stone inside. Outlet of the box connected to the skimmer pump, which have a normal impeller. The skimmer pump sucks through the box outlet and get a lot of small bubbles up to the skimmer.

If you are right - we will get the best skimmer ever - and a continuous stream of nanobubbles into the DT as a side effect!

Or do I go in the wrong direction again?

Sincerely Lasse

 

[Lasse]

Lasse, for what it's worth, you speak (or write) better English than most of us on this forum.

Thanks d2mini

Sincerely Lasse

 

[Chibils]

If it's true that meshwheel pumps cannot produce as small of a bubble as a limewood airstone, perhaps Lasse is onto something!

 

[Cruz_Arias]

Until now I have lived convinced that the needle wheel and mesh wheels was developed to provide as small bubbles as possible. This is because small bubbles provide increased foaming
Apparently I was wrong in this because you claim that a wooden air stone and a normal impeller to a return pump provides finer bubbles.

So maybe - the best skimmer construction is to make a box with inlet and outlet. That box should contain a wooden air stone inside. Outlet of the box connected to the skimmer pump, which have a normal impeller. The skimmer pump sucks through the box outlet and get a lot of small bubbles up to the skimmer.

If you are right - we will get the best skimmer ever - and a continuous stream of nanobubbles into the DT as a side effect!

Or do I go in the wrong direction again?

Sincerely Lasse

We are working on that currently but will not disclose the design.

 

[Cruz_Arias]

If it's true that meshwheel pumps cannot produce as small of a bubble as a limewood airstone, perhaps Lasse is onto something!

We've been working on that for the last 3 years... and is also patent pending...

 

[Cruz_Arias]

 

[Thales]

So there is a product coming?

 

[Lasse]

I'm not convinced that all of these papers discussing things like ozone microbubbles or bubbles created by ultasound cavitation relate that much to what we are doing, but the last one does suggest that ordinary microbubbles create radicals when collapsing. If enough free radicals are generated, the effect may be readily observed by ORP, and there is the potential concern for ORP getting too high with too much bubbling. One generally doesn't want to expose living tissue to free radicals.

OTOH, if the effects in reef tanks come just from aeration and organic removal, the ORP may rise but should not get too high.

@Randy Holmes-Farley If we leave the bubble size apart and consider free radical production of collapsed microbubbles. Could this explain some of the positive experiences with this method (microscrubbing) and killing of dinos? Because there is some positive reports of using hydrogen peroxide against dino and cyano – (hydrogen peroxide is a known producer of free radicals)

To use ORP to detect this can be tricky because one of the side effects of microbubbling, during certain circumstances, is that it will give a rise of the pH (and pH affect ORP)


Sincerely Lasse

 

[Lasse]

Is this done under pressure?

Sincerely lasse

 

[Randy Holmes-Farley Verified Community Expert]

@Randy Holmes-Farley If we leave the bubble size apart and consider free radical production of collapsed microbubbles. Could this explain some of the positive experiences with this method (microscrubbing) and killing of dinos? Because there is some positive reports of using hydrogen peroxide against dino and cyano – (hydrogen peroxide is a known producer of free radicals)

To use ORP to detect this can be tricky because one of the side effects of microbubbling, during certain circumstances, is that it will give a rise of the pH (and pH affect ORP)

Maybe and yes, the ORP measurements are complicated by pH.

Also, adding hydrogen peroxide sometimes (all times I know of personally) results in an ORP drop for reasons that are not clear by may relate to stabilizers.