What Media Should I Put In

[k2snowboards88]

Sorry for all the questions recently. I just got home from chicago and i'm doing a bunch of tank maintanance. I bought a new filter recently. I used to have a marineland non-biowheel filter. It was so terribly clogged when i got back that the water was flowing over and around the filters. The worst part is that when i replaced the blue mechanical fiter cartriges, I realized they they wern't blocking the flow. It was the bio-filtration cartridge. I rinsed them off in tank water and they still weren't allowing water to flow through them. So i went out and bought a penguin 330 biowheel filter so i'll never have that problem again.

My question is this: My filter came with baskets to put extra filter media in. What kind of media do you use and why? What do you think i should use.

Tank: 55 gallons
Fish: 8 tiger barbs
1 gold gourami
4 clown loaches
1 green severum
1 peacock eel (i see him about once a month. I assumed he was staving to death because i hadn't seen him eat anything ever since i bought the loaches when he went into hiding. But i guess he's surviving somehow because that was 10 months ago and i still see him from time to time.)
1 common plec

 

[modernhamlet]

Sorry for all the questions recently. I just got home from chicago and i'm doing a bunch of tank maintanance. I bought a new filter recently. I used to have a marineland non-biowheel filter. It was so terribly clogged when i got back that the water was flowing over and around the filters. The worst part is that when i replaced the blue mechanical fiter cartriges, I realized they they wern't blocking the flow. It was the bio-filtration cartridge. I rinsed them off in tank water and they still weren't allowing water to flow through them. So i went out and bought a penguin 330 biowheel filter so i'll never have that problem again.

My question is this: My filter came with baskets to put extra filter media in. What kind of media do you use and why? What do you think i should use.

Tank: 55 gallons
Fish: 8 tiger barbs
1 gold gourami
4 clown loaches
1 green severum
1 peacock eel (i see him about once a month. I assumed he was staving to death because i hadn't seen him eat anything ever since i bought the loaches when he went into hiding. But i guess he's surviving somehow because that was 10 months ago and i still see him from time to time.)
1 common plec

That's a lot of bio load. I would focus on additional biofiltration. Ceramic rings or other highly porous material would be best. One option would be to run both filters, with the old one focused on mechanical and the new one focused on biological filtration. For mechanical, try polyester batting. You can get it for dirt cheap at fabric and craft stores. You can rinse it several times, but when it gets dirty enough, you can just throw it away.

 

[k2snowboards88]

ceramic rings? Where would i get those? What about getting foam meant for biological filtration? Does the ceramic ring work better?

 

[modernhamlet]

ceramic rings? Where would i get those? What about getting foam meant for biological filtration? Does the ceramic ring work better?

Look like this:

More surface area (in theory) than the foam. More durable and easier to clean, that's for sure...

 

[Inchworm]

Hi k2snowboards88

I use filter floss in my AquaClear chambers for years and find it to be the least expensive and most easily cleaned media available. It works for both biological and mechanical filtration since the bacteria have the surface of all the strands to grow on.

It's the same thing as the polyester batting that modernhamlet told you about. If you buy it in a craft store, just be certain that what you get is 100% polyester and not a cotton blend. It will last for as long as you want to keep rinsing it out, but it does get to looking bad after a while. The appearance does not effect it's ability to do a good job though.