UV clarifier

How a pond uv works

Have you ever wondered how your U.V clarifier works? or what is inside it? well wonder no more.

They should also NOT be called steraliser since it does not actually sterilise

As the drawing  shows it is very simple. basically you have a tube in which every thing sits, we will call this the outer tube. This outer tube is usually made from a plastic. Attached to the outer tube is an inlet and outlet (some models have hose tails) 

Inside this there is a quartz tube (it has to be quarts to allow the ultra violet light through) the quartz tube is held in position by a "o" ring at each end which is in turn secured (not shown)

Inside the quartz tube is an ultra violet tube (never look at an unprotected lit u.v. tube.) 

The water comes in through the inlet circulates between the quartz tube and the outer tube. The u.v. light makes the small microscopic bacteria stick together making them big enough for a biological filter's mechanical filtration to catch them, so removing them from your pond.

As they do not kill any thing we feel it is wrong to call them steralisers, and yes u.v does stand for Ultra Violet (at the high end of the light spectrum)

We did not show any of the electrical connection for simplicity.

Different versions are available some with modern "single ended" u.v tubes, some with spirals to make the "contact" time longer but they all work on the same principal. Since it should be left running 24 / 7 throughout the entire pond season, this means the UV lamp will only last 6-9 months, so should be changed at the beginning of every pond season.