Bio-bale bad? Help me get rid of bubbles!

[d2mini]

Ok, so here's what's going on...
I have a CPR CY-192 that i'm using as my sump.
Here's what it looks like...



Sorry, the pic is small but how it works is the water drops in from the top on the very left near the front corner. It's really rushing in from my overflow and creates a lot of micro bubbles, big bubbles, etc. It's like niagara falls. Inside this same chamber is the pump/skimmer column. Then the water passes over an adjustable gate (this gate adjusts the water height in the first chamber, effecting the performance of the skimmer) and into the second chamber. Normally this chamber is filled with bio-bale as seen in the pic. The bio-bale sits on some of that plastic grating like used in frag tanks. The water flows over the gate, through a sheet of filter media, onto the bio-bale and filters down to an empty cavity in the base of that chamber, under the plastic grate. The water level here is at about 1/3rd the height of the chamber. Then what you can't really see in the pic is the last chamber that runs along the back of the unit behind the first chamber. This is where the outlet bulkhead is. On the left hand side wall. I have an external pump hooked up to this bulkhead sending water back up to the tank.

Now, I heard that when using live rock/sand the bio-bale is not needed and can actually be harmful. So i removed it. Instead, i have one layer of live rock rubble in there. The water level is above the top of the live rock so the rock is completely submersed. But there is a lot of space between the top of the water level and the filter pad above it. So the water flows onto the filter pad and then drops into the water below it, creating more bubbles/turbulence, rather than softly trickling through the bio-bale. You can see this in the pic below. So the water that enters the last chamber has micro bubbles in it and those are being sucked up by the pump and deposited into my tank.

So what I'm wondering is...
A) Can I add a lot more rock in there to give the water a lot more surface area to flow over, and lessening the turbulence in that chamber, hopefully creating less bubbles, even though half the rock would be above water?

or B) Can I add SOME bio-bale on top of the live rock, to act as that cushion, again slowing down the water fall, without ill effects?

Any thoughts on this?
Here's the pic of my actual setup... it's hard to see the right hand side chamber but you get the idea.
TIA!

[yote]

Thats basically the same problem I ran into with a Pro-Clear wet/dry.
What I ended up doing.Was using bio-balls to quiet and subdue the flow.But I'd rinse all the balls in hot fresh water once a week to help control nitrates.

[d2mini]

So do you think I should try going with option B, and just rinse the bio-bale once a week?

[yote]

It'd be cheaper than using live rock.Which is basically going to act the same as the bale if its not completely submerged.

[reeffreak]

You can add more rock as long as it's underwater.Otherwise it will be the same as using bale,balls.

If you are wanting another solution.Buy polyester fill and put it on top the rock rubble,replace weekly.The fine poly will trap debris and cut down on microbubbles.

[daugherty]

why does that sump drain into the same chamber that is returning the water thats were the bubbles are comming from. the biobail side looks like it is for the skimmer return water.

[d2mini]

James, you can't see it but the drain line dumps water into the skimmer column section. But there is another section behind it. That's where the water leaves. Those two are two separate sections, plus the section where the bio-bale/rock is so that makes 3 total. The water basically does a big u-turn.

[daugherty]

ok well there goes my idea

[d2mini]

Originally Posted by daugherty

ok well there goes my idea

haha, oh well, thanks for trying.
Maybe I'll try the polyester fill that reeffreak mentioned. Or a sheet of the same polyester filter material under the rock that i have suspended above the rock.

Or what if I installed a baffle or two in the return section... Do you think anything like that would help?

[daugherty]

i do think that a baffle would help. i had to lay a peice of poly fill over the top of the last baffle since when the water went over it made a lot of bubbles that the pump sucked up and that helped.