Well.. I guess I am kind of back. On a break between semesters at school right now and had an idea about a CA reactor. So I built it. Keep in mind it isn't completed. I need to hook in the return from the circ pump(forgot to buy one fitting Grrrr..) and figure out where to drill and tap for a recirc loop. As it stands now the effluent feed from the top of the reactor is fed back into a small venturi to ensure suction from the top of the reactor back into the circ pump. I'll post all five pics then a bit of a description.
My logic for the design of this reactor is this;
I wanted to minimize fittings outside the reactor and plumbing. So to do this I had to have both come out of the bottom. I also wanted to have an upflow reactor.To be able to do this I needed to draw the water in the reactor back down. Without having a stupid amount of piping inside I needed to split the chamber in two. Easiest way to do this is exactly that. Split it in two. Doing this with a circular chamber would be a bit tricky to ensure a strong bond of all the acrylic inside. So I went and bought $25 worth of pre cut arcylic and made is square. Twice as much as I needed as it turns out. On one half of the reactor the water is foced up through the media and then passes over the divider and then back down to the outlet and circulation pump. the downflow area should trap any possible bits of media that were broken apart and would then possibly be sent out of the reactor as particles. Thus giving the benefits of BOTH styles of reactors currently used. To make sure that I am sending the "cleanest" possible effluent out I have built in a small diameter acrylic tube inside the downflow side to just above the outlet to the circ pump. A piece of poly tubing is then fed down to the void space between the foam and the outlet which is used as the effluent out to the tank.
I'll drill and tap for the recirc line when I test it with media in the reactor and salt water inside just prior to use.
clear as mud?