Cleaning The Filter

[snowdrop]

hi everyone, I'm a little new to this forum (first time posting a topic~! nice site)

anyways, I've heard that to keep a filter running properly, you have to clean it once in a while. I have a recently cycled tank and I was wondering if it was okay to clean my filter (my dad says the filter is starting to get dirty) because I've read from a book that you aren't supposed to unplug the filter, or you have to start cycling all over again and the buildup in the filter would kill most of the fishies

If these two things are true, I was just wondering how I should clean my filter..? I'm planning to do it by the end of this week

Also....
I'm still relatively new at fish keeping All I have now is one WCMM with a few ghost shrimp in a 15 gallon tank--I'm considering to get more of these fishies soon (5, so it'll be happier) If I have some extra room, what other fish should I consider getting..?

 

[OldMan47]

Whenb you do your next water change, rinse out the filter parts in the bucket of old tank water and put it all back together. As soon as you get the water level back to normal you can start it again. The idea of not unplugging the filter is more about the idea that if you unplug it each night because you can't sleep with the noise you will destroy the bacterial colony on the filter. It is not saying you can't unplug it to clean it.

 

[Miss Wiggle]

yup as oldman say's it can be unplugged temporarily.

you can tell when a filter needs cleaning because the flow rate drops, if it seems tp be pushing out less water than before then it needs a clean.

never ever clean the media out in tap water, always remove a bucket of water from the tank and gently squeeze out sponges or rinse out any other media in there, just clean half the media at any one time. also be careful not to let the media dry out, as long as it's kept wet/damp then the bacteria should be fine

 

[snowdrop]

Okay, thank you I'll try that on the weekend.
The flow rate is starting to slow down, so I think I should just clean the sponge this weekend.
Or should I also clean the contents within the filter...? There are some dirty stuff (sucked up flake food, a bit of algae) beside the sponge-It's not floating around, but I'm just wondering if I might as well get rid of it.

Thank you =) I know I'm a bit annoying by asking all these questions, but I don't want to do anything wrong

 

[OldMan47]

When you are done, the filter should look clean but some of the sponges and such will still have some color from the things that have gone through. If there is still a visible layer on things, give them another swish in the bucket.

 

[rabbut]

You should clean your filter as often as the flow drops, as oldman says, and when you clean it, only do half the media at a time, as Miss Wiggle advises. My tip of the day; a well loved filter will be premenantly discoloured by the muck in it. Avoid very vigourous cleaning of the media, or you risk putting the tank into a mini-cycle Basically in that I am saying you shouldn't clean the filter because it looks filty, I'm saying clean it due to a drop in flow. A filter can be too clean

All the best
Rabbut

 

[waterdrop]

I agree with all the others. The ideal filter should always seem dirty to some extent. In fact it is expected that films of bio material will stick to the surfaces of filter media and make it a better "catcher" of floating debris, so a brand new clean filter is not as good a filter as an older dirty looking one.

~~waterdrop~~

 

[andywg]

never ever clean the media out in tap water,

when you clean it, only do half the media at a time ... Avoid very vigourous cleaning of the media, or you risk putting the tank into a mini-cycle

Unless, of course, you have specific mechanical media that is not used as biological media in your filter; then you are best off blasting the thing under a mains pressure showerhead to get rid of as much physical waste as possible and prevent it breaking down.

 

[Miss Wiggle]

yes, but lets not confuse the issue here, as for the vast majority of set up's the mechanical filtration will also be serving as biological filtration so cleaning it too vigorously could result in a serious loss of bacteria and ultimatley in a cycling tank.

 

[andywg]

yes, but lets not confuse the issue here, as for the vast majority of set up's the mechanical filtration will also be serving as biological filtration so cleaning it too vigorously could result in a serious loss of bacteria and ultimatley in a cycling tank.

Hardly that confusing. I would rather we don't train people to shout "You must never rinse any media under the tap" and be caught out as not knowing the full facts when they see me describe my maintenance regime (as I seem to recall has happened before).

Let's be honest:

Simple and misleading

or

Slightly more involved and accurate


I think we all know where I prefer the advice to be...

 

[Miss Wiggle]

OK, I've had the best part of a bottle of wine so I have no intention of arguing over this. I take your point.

 

[snowdrop]

I'm pretty sure my filter is like many others it's external, and yes, the water flow has dropped quite a bit lately, so I'll rinse the sponge at Saturday or Sunday.

The filter has the three layers (sponge on bottom, carbon middle, and this biological filtratioin thing on top [lost the package of the biological part]). It's an Aquaclear filter for 30 US gallons that was used previously by my cousin (given to me because he was moving) and unused for a week or two, so I assumed the beneficial bacteria was dead and performed a cycle for it [successfully ]

I hope this additional information is helpful...=)

and thanks for the advice, everyone~!

 

[Aussie_Dog]

My main question is how to keep the "backwash" (I guess that's the technical term) from clouding up the water. Every time I turn off the filter and try to extract the "tray" with the filter media, dirty water flows out into the tank water, clouding it up. Sometimes, turning off the water kills the syphon action of the intake tube, and that water flows back out and all the water from the resevoir (lets call it that) flows out through that tube, so again, dirty cloudy water. Basically, the only thing I can do to keep that from happening is to turn off the filter and quickly lift the whole thing out and chuck it in a bucket already filled with tank water, and then I clean it the usual way. My big beef is just in the backwash part.

I have Aquaclear filters, fyi. Except for the Eclipse tanks that came with their own filters, all I have are Aquaclear filters, lol

 

[waterdrop]

The carbon will just be wasting space that could be used for more biomedia. Carbon only adsorbs chemicals for about 3 days and then is ready to be disposed of. The types of biomedia you can consider are ceramic pebbles, ceramic rings, "bioballs", or more sponge. Since you already have sponge, which is quite good for both mechanical filtration and biological filtration, I suggest you consider ceramic ring type media as your carbon replacement. It lasts more or less forever and is easy to clean just by pouring the rings into a plastic cup in your bucket of tank water during filter cleaning.

~~waterdrop~~

 

[snowdrop]

The carbon will just be wasting space that could be used for more biomedia. Carbon only adsorbs chemicals for about 3 days and then is ready to be disposed of. The types of biomedia you can consider are ceramic pebbles, ceramic rings, "bioballs", or more sponge. Since you already have sponge, which is quite good for both mechanical filtration and biological filtration, I suggest you consider ceramic ring type media as your carbon replacement. It lasts more or less forever and is easy to clean just by pouring the rings into a plastic cup in your bucket of tank water during filter cleaning.

~~waterdrop~~

what exactly is a ceramic ring type media? and will I be able to get it from my LFS?