Setting up your Clear Water Scrubber:

1) Mount the scrubber over the sump or above it elsewhere with either an in-sump stand, wall mount stand or whatever you want to use to hold the unit. It will need to be above the full line of your sump as the lamps cannot be submerged. They are splash proof and not 100% waterproof.
2) Hook up the scrubber with either a secondary pump or off a manifold.
3) To accurately determine the correct flow for the scrubber, the tray should be full of water but not so much that it is overflowing over the sides. Overflowing over the sides will increase the sound coming from the scrubber.
4) Initially the lamps for the scrubber should be run 24/7 to seed the screen. Once the screen is seeded, the run time on the lamps can be reduced if necessary. If you are running a UV sterilizer, shut it off for the 1st week or two as this will prevent the scrubber from seeding. The run time of the lamps controls the nutrient uptake for the algae. Cut back in 4hr increments until the desired balance is achieved.
5) Included in each unit is a bottle of iron/trace element replacement. This is a very concentrated dose of those elements. You should get an initial ICP analysis done so that you know where your levels are before starting the scrubber. The algae growing inside the scrubber will consume these elements to grow. This sample bottle is to replace those elements. Dosing amounts based on water volume can be found on Captiv8 Aquaculture’s website.
6) The initial seeding/harvest should take around 3-6 weeks. After that initial time frame, harvesting of the screen should be around every 7-14 based on growth rates. You can either just throw the algae away or use it as food for your fish.

How do I Clean My Scrubber?

Generally, and except for specific continuous-filtering or continuous-cultivating versions, algae scrubbers require the algae to be removed (“harvested”) periodically from the scrubber. This removal of algae has the effect of removing undesired nutrients from the water because the algae used the nutrients in order to grow. The algae is generally removed either:

Every 7 to 21 days, or
When it is black, or
When it fills up the scrubber, or
When it starts letting go, or
When nutrients start to rise in the water.

For waterfall versions, the screen is removed from the pipe and cleaned in a sink with running water. The pipe is removed also, and the slot is cleaned with a toothbrush, to remove any algae that have grown up into it. After the algae are removed, the screen and pipe are put back in the scrubber.

Sizing (Tank capacity)

Dimensions: LxWxH

CWS Algae Scrubbers & Accessories Available here:

Setup, Install, and Maintenance

Setting up your Clear Water Scrubber: