carbon in a system

well carbon removes impurities in the water. it does seem to help to run it occasionally if you need to clean a tank up. many people run it on here all the time. its kind of a personal preference. it does make your water crystal clear, but if you have algae you have too many nutrients in your tank. meaning you have a higher bioload than what your filtration allows for. You can help this by doing regular water changes and testing nitrates etc. this could also be an over feeding problem. I feed my fish probably about 4 or 5 times a day, BUT i do it in small quantities. some people put too MUCH food in too often.

Ok that is what I understood, about but i heard the it would help withe the algea as well.  thanks for clearing that up for me.  Dustin.  Any thing else that I need to know about running carbon in my system?  I think I am going to run it 24/7 so any help would be greatly appericated.  Dustin

Thanks I did rinse the carbon I just put it in.  I put it in right next to my over flow out let that is in my sump.  so all the water that come down the drain gets to pass through the carbon.  If I had a canister I would run it that way

oh thats a good point.  thanks

I would be interested in hearing the results when you get them Scott.

The clarity of the water is why it would appear that the coral are better color. Algae is an absolute necessity in every reef tank. Mostly we like to see coralline and macroalgae. The reason we all should have around one snail per gallon is that the algae which is so good for our tanks because it filters the water needs to be kept under control so that it doesn't become a nusiance. Using a Refugium or if a Refugium isn't possible, growing macroalgae in the main tank is a very good way to help control nusiance algae.

Nope. It has always worked great for me.

Phosguard is cheaper than Rowaphos and I just use either one in a filter sack in my overflow for about a month at a time.

I run carbon and phosphate absorber continuously in my system.  The best way to run them, I think, is to use the phosban reactor

http://www.twolittlefishies.com/tlf_prod_access.html?lang_id=1

That way, you force water to run through the carbon and phosphate absorber, resulting in a much better efficiency.  I run two of them in tandem; one for phosphate absorber, one for carbon.

As far as phosphate absorber goes, there are two kinds: aluminum-based and iron-based.  The phosguard that Rfoote mentioned was aluminum-based.  The theoretical drawback is that they can leak aluminum into water, which can be irritating to some soft corals.  Having said that, Aquatica display tank uses phosguard and doesn't have any problem with the many softies in the tank.  There are many iron-based phos absorbers.  Rowasphos is notoriously expensive.  You can buy the equivalent at Twopartsolution.com for a much cheaper price (a third or a quater of the price).

As far as carbon goes, you can also buy them in bulk from Twopartsolution.com at a very reasonable price.  They are very small, which is great because that means big surface area for carbon to absorb all the nasty stuffs the tank.  However, that means that you have to use the reactor to run them. 

Mike do you have a pic. of the Two little fishies reactor?