- I think the hobby's become pretty familiar
with what a fleece roller is and how it works.
Water from the overflow of your aquarium
drains into the body, passes through a sheet of fleece,
and travels through the rest of the sump.
As the fleece gets dirty, it raises the water level
inside of the fleece roller and triggers a sensor
that tells the motor to roll up some dirty fleece,
exposing new fleece.
It just beats the heck out of cleaning
and swapping out filter socks.
Red Sea's ReefMat works the exact same way,
except it has a bunch of new tricks up its sleeve,
making it a huge step forward for fleece rollers,
offering an impressive list of features that make
adding and using a fleece roller so much easier to do
while also being the first app-controlled fleece roller
available to reefers, which has some distinct advantages.
The ReefMat is available in two sizes,
the 500, rated for up to 1,580 gallons per hour of flow
and aquariums of approximately 130 gallons,
as well as the 1200, rated for up to 2,380 gallons
per hour of flow and aquariums of up to around 315 gallons,
which covers a very wide range of aquariums.
So let's dig into what makes the ReefMat stand out
from all of the other fleece rollers
that reefers currently have access to.
I think one of the most obvious advantages
is the fact that the ReefMat has app control
through Red Sea's ReefBeat app,
which does offer some great tools
that I'm gonna dig into shortly.
Red Sea put a tremendous amount of thought
into the overall design of the ReefMat,
with ease of use being at the top of the list.
It uses an ingenious loading system that allows you
to easily swap fleece rolls without having
to remove the unit from the sump
or turning off the return pump,
and without having to feed the fleece past a barrage
of rollers with barely any clearance under the stand.
It's actually that easy.
Instead of using optical or mechanical sensors
like we've seen on other fleece rollers,
Red Sea has opted for a dual-input
titanium conductivity sensor for added reliability,
plus Red Sea even thought to include
a well-executed media basket where the water exits
for chemical media like carbon, GFO, Chemi-pure,
Purity or even biological media if that's what you prefer,
which is a great use of space below the fleece roller
that would otherwise go unused.
The ReefMat also offers ambidextrous installation,
with both the sensor and drive unit
as well as the hose connection being able to be installed
on either side of the body, making it easier to adapt
to a wider variety of sump and plumbing configurations.
It also has both the option to hang on the edge of sumps
with panels up to three quarters of an inch thick,
with rubber bumpers to provide a soft
vibration-absorbing padding where the body
of the unit meets the sump, or the ability
to be free-standing with the use of four legs
with rubber feet, which works best for sumps
with thicker panels or braces
that won't allow for it to hang.
Red Sea also includes corrugated hose
with a threaded collar for quickly connecting
and disconnecting the ReefMat, as well as a union adapter
and sealant for plumbing the ReefMat
to your aquarium's drain line, meaning you likely
won't need to purchase any other fittings
to get it set up on your system,
which is a really nice touch
and adds to the overall value of the ReefMat.
Now, before I dive into the app,
I want to talk about the fleece
that Red Sea selected for the ReefMat,
because they were quite purposeful in their selection
of using a 200-micron fleece, which is less dense
or has larger pores than a lot of the fleece mesh
that other filter rollers use.
Using a 200-micron fleece means you'll still pull out
all of the important solid waste like uneaten food,
fish poop, bits of algae and dusty particles from the water,
but without it getting clogged up with super-fine particles
that would cause the fleece to get used up far too quickly.
This is super important because it'll keep
the efficiency of the fleece high
and ongoing running cost of the ReefMat low,
since you won't be blowing through rolls of fleece
needlessly over-polishing the water.
You can actually keep track of how much fleece
is being used through the ReefBeat app.
Right on the dashboard, you'll be able to see
how much of the roll has been used total,
how much has been used today, and what the daily average is.
The app will also notify you when your roll is about to end,
so you can make sure you replace it in time.
You can even tap through to see an expanded graph
of usage for the week, as well as for the month,
view the mat dispensing log, turn auto-advance on or off,
tap to manually roll up some fleece and reset
the remaining fleece counter when adding a new roll.
You can also access advanced settings
to dial in the ReefMat perfectly for your system
by setting the mat advance length,
choose how many days you'd like the app to notify you
before a roll is about to end, look at the roll history
and also change the drive position or model,
if you ever decide to change things up.
The ReefMat, like all of the other
ReefBeat app-controlled devices from Red Sea,
will give your tank a heartbeat as well.
If the ReefMat loses connection to the cloud,
like during a power outage, you'll get notified
on your smart device, letting you know,
giving you critical time to get back to your aquarium.
Now I'm gonna level with you.
While all of the specs and features of the ReefMat
are absolutely fantastic, where you really get
to see it shine is through practical testing,
and Jake Adams of Reef Builders has been running his
on a beautiful SPS reef tank, so you can check out
his thoughts on using the ReefMat here
and see exactly why he dubbed it Red Sea's crowning jewel
of aquarium design and engineering.
Check it out.
(upbeat music)