The Nyos Torq is one of the most innovative new media reactor designs we’ve seen in the reef aquarium hobby for several years. First revealed in Germany at InterZoo back in May, Nyos has been tweaking and refining the Nyos reactor ever since and now it’s finally trickling out to reefers globally.
Whereas most media reactors are a basic tube which may or may not include a pump, Nyos saw the need to offer up the Torq as two distinct components, the Torq Dock and the Torq Body. As you might expect, the Torq Dock is the base of the reactor which contains the pump driving the assembly. The pump inside the Torq Dock is rated for up to 1,000 liters per hour (264gph) with a power consumption of 12 watts.
The Torq Body is available in three different sizes, a 2.0 liter, a 1.0 liter and a 0.75 liter. The Body 2.0 is 100 mm in diameter and 17 inches tall, or 21 inches overall when mounted to the Torq Dock. The Body 1.0 is the same heigh as the 2.0 but 70 mm in diameter. Finally the Body 0.75 is the same diameter as the Body 1.0 but only 14 inches tall, or 18 inches overall when coupled with the dock.
The Nyos Torq has two neat tricks up its acrylic sleeve; first is how the Body is quickly attached and removed from the Torq Base, making for quick maintenance and refill of the media inside the chamber of the body. Secondly, the flow rate/flow through can be easily adjusted by twisting the Body relative to the Dock – and if that’s too much flow out of the gate the output can be further reduced by a sliding dial on the pump intake.
The water exiting the Torq actually flows down the sides of the reactor chamber and we had concerns that this might produce a lot of splashing as it crashed into the water surface into which it is operating. This was a minor issue when we first set up the Torq but after a couple days the hydrophobic residue of the acrylic washes away and it became significantly quieter.
At a price of between $179 for the Dock with the 0.75 Body the Nyos Torq is certainly a premium price for a small media reactor. If you’re looking for a nano reactor there are certainly much smaller and more affordable options out there.
However if you’re really interested in the Torq for the larger 2.0 liter for use on a large tank, the combination Dock and Body is ‘only’ $225 which is actually quite competitive compared to similar medium to large media reactors. Where the Nyos Torq media reactor really stands out is in the ease of use and quick maintenance which will feel like a luxury when changing out biopellets, GFO or activated carbon.
