Air Driven Filters?

[Rorie]

When i picked up my discus the other day, the breeder was explaining all about his set up. He has air driven filters which i had never heard of. So i got him to explain, and he gifted me two of them!

So there is an airline which goes into a column which is surrounded by a huge bit of filter media. the air sucks in water through the media, and hence, filters the water.

Why have i never heard of these before?! haha, Seems so simple, and easy to run several from one pump! Are there negatives to having them?

For its operation, how do i know how much air it needs? I could flood the thing with air as its only in a 30L tank and has a large air pump.... this will filter the water quicker? But maybe i want the water flowing through slower?

 

[Tolak]

These are standard equipment for breeding setups, sponge filters & box filters. Sponges are mainly bio filters, boxes, with enough air will do a good job of mechanical filtration. Generally 1 lpm of air is plenty to run either, I run sponges with less air for bio, boxes loaded with floss with more air for mechanical.

You want to bleed off excess air with an air pump rather than choking it off to reduce air flow. This eliminates excess back pressure, heat, and premature diaphragm failure. For multiple filters off of a smaller pump this means using a gang valve with an extra valve or two to bleed it off, in larger setups a bleed valve is installed for this purpose.

 

[Rorie]

These are standard equipment for breeding setups, sponge filters & box filters. Sponges are mainly bio filters, boxes, with enough air will do a good job of mechanical filtration. Generally 1 lpm of air is plenty to run either, I run sponges with less air for bio, boxes loaded with floss with more air for mechanical.

You want to bleed off excess air with an air pump rather than choking it off to reduce air flow. This eliminates excess back pressure, heat, and premature diaphragm failure. For multiple filters off of a smaller pump this means using a gang valve with an extra valve or two to bleed it off, in larger setups a bleed valve is installed for this purpose.

This will sound like a stupid question, when you say 'mechanical filtration' what do you mean? Is the difference that the mech filter will clean the water? Where as the bio will just have the biological filter?

Is there any downfalls to using this (its the sponge filter i have) rather than a 'normal' filter?

 

[Tolak]

Mechanical filtration removes the solid particles from the water, fish waste and leftover food for the most part. Bio filtration has to do with the nitrification process, ammonia>nitrite>nitrate. Sponge filters, with a large surface area for the amount of water flow are excellent bio filters, and with enough flow will act as mechanical filters. Generally a powerhead is used for these higher flow rates, though with air they do remove smaller particles.

Sponge filters alone are generally used with fry tanks, no worry about fry getting sucked into the filter. Breeders usually run bare bottom tanks with fry, so the mechanical filtration is taken care of by frequent maintenance.

 

[Rorie]

ok, so i guess the only real negative is that it doesnt clean the rubbish out my water?

I have it in my QT just now cycling, so it is bare bottom which is fine