Sand

[ricky.marples]

Ive, got a 60 litle elite tank with a stringray filter. ive got about an inch of sand on the bottom of my tank, but my filter is kicking up the sand and circulation it around, ive tried moving the filter into several places but i just cant seem to get the sand to settle, does anybody have any ideas or tips for me?

 

[ricky.marples]

Ive, got a 60 litle elite tank with a stringray filter. ive got about an inch of sand on the bottom of my tank, but my filter is kicking up the sand and circulating it around, ive tried moving the filter into several places but i just cant seem to get the sand to settle, does anybody have any ideas or tips for me?

 

[Ryefish]

the sand should be rather heavy for the filter. how close if your filter to the actual sand?

 

[ricky.marples]

the tank is just over a foot tall,and the filter is at the top. its not kicking up large amounts, buts its just causing like a dust of sand to be floating around.

 

[ricky.marples]

sorted it, the top of the filter was above the water line which caused it to make a stronger current, ive pushed it under the water and the problem has stopped, just now theres no air being put into the water by the filter, will i need an air pump?

 

[elisew]

As long as the water has some movement at the surface it will be fine, you don't need to have major movement in the water for it to be right.

 

[ricky.marples]

sound, cheers

 

[waterdrop]

One problem we've had with the stingray filters is that its been reported by a few owners and we've had a few cases we've observed here in the beginners section that these filters can allow too much pass-through (where the filter allows water to leak past the media unfiltered. In the past this has created a very frustrating time for people trying to grow the necessary two species of bacteria and qualify the media as being a "working biofilter" so that they can get their first stocking of fish.

The filters also use a technique for clearing trace ammonia where a chemical resin (called Zeolite) is used to just straight out remove the ammonia chemically. The idea is that the majority of the ammonia will be converted to NO2(nitrite) by the A-Bacs in the earlier biomedia stage of the filter, but at a later stage of the water path the Zeolite will grab any excess ammonia that the bacteria didn't convert.

This technique would be perfectly ok except that I think the "pass-through" problem makes it difficult to get the biomedia cycled in the first place, and the Zeolite makes it difficult for you as the testing person to figure out what stage the fishless cycle is in with your test kit and know how far along you are in building your biofilter!

I apologize for this sounding negative - I know that no one wants to bring home new equipment only to hear it might not be the right choice. I just throw this out there as a caution. I believe there may also be a few members who have got these things running ok, so don't go just by this comment.

~~waterdrop~~

 

[OldMan47]

It sounds to me as if your filter is producing too much flow in localized areas of your tank and that is moving the sand. I had that problem in this tank.

What was happening is that I had a filter running that was just moving too much water. When I replaced the filter with one that moved less water, the sand dunes no longer formed. You can indeed have enough circulation to cause you problems that you have seen or that I saw.