Sponge over filter intake..

[Gundy]

I posted a problem a couple of weeks ago about sand wrecking the impeller in my HOB filter. So I went to one of my LFS and found a sponge from a sponge filter, that they let me have for free. I slipped it over my intake and zip tied it to hold it in place - works great for blocking sand. Problem is, now that its been in use for awhile it seems its slowing the flow to a crawl. I was cleaning the tank today and took the sponge off and squeezed it and swished it around in a bucket of water thinking maybe it was clogged but it didn't help.

Should I get a more powerful HOB filter? This is just a small 10 gallon tank, with a cheapo Whisper 10 HOB Filter ( one without the flow adjustments ). Should I even worry about it? Makes me wonder how much water its actually filtering..

 

[Hara]

Swishing my sponge prefilters is never good enough. When I run them under the "jet" setting on the garden hose sprayer, a ton of garbage will come out. You might want to try that and see if it helps.

 

[Gundy]

Run it under tap water super high from the faucet?

Won't that fubar up the sponge and destroy the bacteria in my tank when I place it back over the intake?

 

[Hara]

the sponge isnt being used as biological filtration, it is being used as a mechanical filtration method in your case. If you clean it well and return it, the bacteria that has left the sponge is really irrelevant. No media in the sponge is not going to affect the rest of the filtration in the tank.

 

[Gundy]

I see, and the chlorine from the tap won't affect the tank?

 

[Hara]

If you are concerned about that, then soak it in water with declorinator in it before putting it back in the tank. Shouldnt take but a bowl full. I have well water, so it is not an issue for me.

 

[Jchillin]

For the amount of surface area on the sponge, using regular water won't harm anything. The amount of bacteria die-off that you would get wouldn't be noticeable.