Gravel Cleaners

[Bloo]

Thanks good to know Jasper. Though it works on exactly the same principal. Just more powerful I presume. Still a total waste of money in my opinion for reasons already mentioned. And guess being more powerful, would make the particle breakdown even worse. Mmmm nice - fish swiming around in particle poo

 

[Number 1 Jasper]

Thanks good to know Jasper. Though it works on exactly the same principal. Just more powerful I presume. Still a total waste of money in my opinion for reasons already mentioned. And guess being more powerful, would make the particle breakdown even worse. Mmmm nice - fish swiming around in particle poo

That is a VERY good point , anyone else have any ideas ? like i say , its just for mid week cleaning , i do a 25% wtaer change using a syphon tube every sunday .

 

[dgwebster]

the reason is the tank isnt due for a water change, which also costs in decholirnator. the purpose of siphoning out into a bucket (through a net) is the clean the tank from uneaten food and excess poo maybe every other day/as required. means less faffing about with decholorinator and time.

 

[5andra]

Hi glad you posted this hubby asked me to see about one today at leat now i know what he was on about, as the story goes his mate has one and he wants one too lol

At least now i can ask if he wants the battery one or the electric? this should give him a puzzeler for a bit. he he , bless he will either want a better one than his mate or the same!!!!!!!! go figure

 

[csjasona]

I bought one from eBay for about £10. Complete and utter waste of time and money! It didn't even 'suck' at all - it just had a small fan that was supposed to aggravate the substrate. Tried it a few times and found that I'd get more suction by sucking the ater myself (I did not try that, though!). So, that went in the bin today. I'll just use the regular substrate cleaner from now on - i.e. the water suction pump. You cn very quickly hoover the substrate (if sand) and you only throw a little sand and water away each time.

 

[Number 1 Jasper]

the reason is the tank isnt due for a water change, which also costs in decholirnator. the purpose of siphoning out into a bucket (through a net) is the clean the tank from uneaten food and excess poo maybe every other day/as required. means less faffing about with decholorinator and time.

dechlorinator ? you mean the additive we put in to get rid of the impurities right ?

I bought one from eBay for about £10. Complete and utter waste of time and money! It didn't even 'suck' at all - it just had a small fan that was supposed to aggravate the substrate. Tried it a few times and found that I'd get more suction by sucking the ater myself (I did not try that, though!). So, that went in the bin today. I'll just use the regular substrate cleaner from now on - i.e. the water suction pump. You cn very quickly hoover the substrate (if sand) and you only throw a little sand and water away each time.

Yiou use an electric one ? what make ? i assume you dont mean a manual one ( syphon pump ) as that removes the wtaer as well .

 

[dgwebster]

dechlorinator ? you mean the additive we put in to get rid of the impurities right ?

decholorinator is a water safe treatment to make new water safe for adding to the tank - it doesnt clean the gravel. and it costs money to use every time if i did a water chage every time i would like to clean the gravel. hence why every other day, i clean gravel passing the water through a fine net (to catch uneaten food, dead plant bits (bloody gouramis) and poo, remove the net and pour the water back into the tank, hence clean gravel no water change, no use of water safe treatment, saving money.

once a week i do the water change, spending that bit of money.

done a quick bit of research:

eheim gravel vacuum:

http/www.aquatics-online.co.uk/Z157310.asp

looks pretty decent to me.

very top of this page:

http/www.aquatics-online.co.uk/Z154306.asp

is the PGR 1000 Power Gravel Cleaner

 

[Number 1 Jasper]

dechlorinator ? you mean the additive we put in to get rid of the impurities right ?

decholorinator is a water safe treatment to make new water safe for adding to the tank - it doesnt clean the gravel. and it costs money to use every time if i did a water chage every time i would like to clean the gravel. hence why every other day, i clean gravel passing the water through a fine net (to catch uneaten food, dead plant bits (bloody gouramis) and poo, remove the net and pour the water back into the tank, hence clean gravel no water change, no use of water safe treatment, saving money.

once a week i do the water change, spending that bit of money.

done a quick bit of research:

eheim gravel vacuum:

http/www.aquatics-online.co.uk/Z157310.asp

looks pretty decent to me.

very top of this page:

http/www.aquatics-online.co.uk/Z154306.asp

is the PGR 1000 Power Gravel Cleaner

Thanks ,
They loook good

 

[dgwebster]

have to admit, eheim id be willing to trust and give a go, but at over £50, id be bothered about spending that money on something pants...

 

[bobf]

I have the PGR 1000 plug in one and think its pretty good actually.

The bags that do the filtering are a very fine mesh and are stretchy so they get bigger and bigger as they hold a bigger amount of water as the crap collected builds up. The mesh is of such a small size that you can't really see it and my impression is that the water going back into the tank is pretty much clear of particulate waste. The water isn't forced through the filter bag under pressure it it just flows through under the weight of gravity, like the water returning to the tank from a HOB filter.

Seems very good if you have gravel substrate but all that having been said, I've found I've not bothered with it since switching to sand. With sand the 'droppings' etc just sit on top of the sand and are much easier to catch with your routine water changes. The big difference is that you can see what your doing rather than having to keep washing the gravel 'just in case'.

Moral of the story - if you want cleaner gravel - don't get a hoover get sand!

 

[dgwebster]

well i took the plunge.

I forked out £9.99 for one from Pets@Home (figured I could always flog it on ebay to make some of my money back if it were crap.)

Result: Its one of the BEST things I have ever bought.

However:

I use the vacuum attachement to clean gravel daily in the area i feed - i have to take it off to get a strong enough current to lift crud from my sand tank though. but with it off it works, just have to be extra careful not to suck anyone up.

I use it to easily siphon water out of the tank using a tube attachment (not that this was a big problem anyway)

I use it to siphon water out of a bucket into the tank (this made this much easier - its very difficult to get the bucket higher than the tank for a normal siphon and i dont like pouring it straight in - too uncontrolled and turbulent.

I love it.

 

[morgan]

They are pretty good aren't they? Not too expensive either. Glad you're finding it useful.