Understanding My Filter

[CrustyOnEastCoast]

I have an Aqueon Minibow 5 gallon aquarium. It came with its own filter. The manual that came with the product
is a general one that talks about Aqueon aquariums of various sizes -- not specific to the model I bought.
It indicates that their filters are complete solutions:

"Your Aqueon Power Filter is designed to clean and purify your aquarium water in every way possible: mechanically (by trapping
and removing particulate matter such as food and plant matter); biologically (by supporting a colony of "good" bacteria that process
ammonia and other waste byproducts); chemically (activated carbon filters out harmful gasses and chemicals); and via a web/dry filter
that not only cleans biologically but also significantly improves oxygen levels in the aquarium"

This is a wonderful, assuring sentence, but I am not so sure the general statement applies to my specific model. My filter is connected to the top of the aquarium. There is a tube that extends down, water is sucked up the tube and over the top of the filter, the water is poured onto something that looks like a small version of a filter cartridge you might put in your home furnace (floss pad, is that what it is called?). Then the water is distributed back into the aquarium, and you can see the water surface ripple. There is a picture about disassembling the filter and it shows a cartridge (the flosspad), filter body, impeller, filter tube plate, and filter tube.

So, do I have chemical, biological, and mechanical filtration? Also, where does the bacteria grow? Only on the filter cartridge (floss pad), or inside the filter as well? Hopefully not just the filter cartridge or I can never change it!!

As an aside, I am currently doing a fishless cycle and the numbers looks good, I think ... I am starting to get Nitrites after about 10 days and Ammonia is very slowly dropping.

 

[Gvilleguy]

My only regret in replying to your thread is this statement: I recommend you start over with either:

(1) A new hang on back filter

or

(2) Altered media in the existing, tiny filter tray

So that will cause you to lose the 10 days you have cycled.

I have your exact tank, and I went down the path of cycling that tiny hood filter, and I found it to not have the bio-capacity that left me comfortable for the long haul. The filter pad that you have in there is a carbon pad, so you are doing all of your filtering (mechanical, bio, and chemical) with that little floss pad. The problem is that when the floss pad saturates and needs replacing, there goes all of your beneficial bacteria with it!

Have a read through the fishless cycle thread I did on this mini-bow tank here:

GVG's Mini-Bow Tank Cycle

I first attempted to cycle the filter hood with bio-pellets and a plastic scrubbing pad that already had mature media from my other tank, and even that did not help get it cycled. So then I punted and swapped out for a fairly inexpensive Aquaclear 20 hang on back filter. But I did have to partially cut the filter hood tray to get it to fit. I posted pictures, so please let me know if you have questions after checking it out. The Aquaclear has run great on this tank for 2 1/2 months so far.

Oh, and you'll see it in the other thread - but another design flaw of that built-in filter is the hood light shines right on the media tray, causing it to grow algae - which could inhibit bacterial growth.

 

[Gvilleguy]

I found that the included incandescent light bulb would raise the water temp 3 degrees all on its own, which could be a problem depending on which type of fish you want to keep in there. The heat would also cause a fair bit of condensation up in the hood around the light fixture, which I didn't like, either! At either Lowe's or Home Depot I found a compact fluorescent bulb that fit the hood and did not seem to raise the temp at all.

Here is a picture of the package:

 

[CrustyOnEastCoast]

Thanks! That is a lot of helpful information.

I guess for the moment, I will try to keep the light off as much as possible, or even take it out of the socket.

I think I will continue with my current fish-less cycle. I will try to make this little floss pad last as long as possible. Probably can't really clean it out in tank water, either, might wash the bacteria away! Maybe I will use tweezers, to pick off the large trappings if I see any, and not really rub it or wash it.

Have you heard of the Seachem Matrix product? They are a filter media that look like little pebbles. The company claims they have the capability to host a lot of bacteria. I wonder if I can spread those on top of the floss pad ... then if I ever need to change pads, maybe I can just re-use the same Matrix pebble things and preserve my bacteria colony. (I'll do a search on the forum about it).

Well, if this doesn't work out .. maybe I'll suck it up and get a different filter, and while I'm at it, upgrade to a 10 gallon aquarium, because this 5 gallon one will be quite challenging, I imagine (it will be very sensitive to parameters because of its small size, pollutants can't disperse as easily).

I also have the added headache of the 1.5ppm Ammonia reading in my tap water ... so my water changes will pollute my tank! So I got to have a very well cycled tank in place .. (unless I use Spring water for the water changes).

 

[Gvilleguy]

I have not seen that Matrix product, but I think it might be a great idea for that little filter tray. You might even want to spread a layer of it below the floss pad, since you will have to remove the floss pad more often than the pebbles, and that way you can leave the pebbles mostly undisturbed. It could help minimize the impact of having to change out the floss pad eventually. But that pad has to click into place, doesn't it? So that might not work. Any media similar to those pebbles that you can add will help, though, even on top of the pad.