55g Filtration - Need Advice

[alyxandria]

Okay, so this is my 55g african cichlid tank.



Right now there are:

2x Cobalt Blue
2x Ice Blue
1x Socolofi
3x Bumblebee
2x Blue Dolphin
1x Red Shoulder
1x Sunshine
1x Acei
2x Firefish/Dragon Blood
3x OB

Now, I know this is slightly overstocked but I am going to be moving some fish to another tank once it's ready.

My nitrates have been so high and I can't seem to get them down. I've been using prime and doing water changes every day to every two days, depending when I have the time, but still no change. I have tested the tap water and my nitrates are low, maybe 5ppm.

I am currently running a Fluval C4 powerhead filter and two sponge filters. So I'm looking at adding a canister filter and getting rid of the sponge filters to increase biological and mechanical filtration.

I want to over filtrate this tank as much as possible. What canister filter would you suggest?

I've looked at a whole bunch, Fluval, Eheim, Cobalt Aquatics, JBJ, etc etc. I know I want one with a UVC.

I found one off eBay and have spoken to many people (through group facebook post) that have used it and the reviews are mixed.







Would this filter be sufficient? Are there any other ways I could maximize my filtration in this tank without a sump? (Don't have the space)


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[Mebbid]

A new filter isn't going to fix your nitrate level. It boils down to the amount of food going in versus the amount of water coming out.

How often do you feed? How much do you feed?
How large of a water change do you do?

 

[alyxandria]

I feed twice daily as much as they can eat in about 30 seconds. I make a point to not overfeed. I even skip feeding once a week.

The water changes I have been doing are 50% in effort to get the nitrates down.

I guess I kinda formulated my question weird. It was meant to be two parts. The nitrate issue and I was wanting to upgrade my filtration regardless.


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[Mebbid]

Ahh gotcha

The filter works. I use a similar one on my tank although not that particular model. Same brand though.

As for the nitrates. Drop it down to one feeding daily and do multiple water changes per day. You can do them up to an hour apart.

 

[alyxandria]

Ok I will try that thanks!

And for the filter, I'm gonna give it a go. Can't go wrong at $60 if it works


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[Mebbid]

Ok I will try that thanks!

And for the filter, I'm gonna give it a go. Can't go wrong at $60 if it works


Sent from my iPhone.

They are huge.. Equivalent in size to a 5g bucket

 

[aqua_holic]

Not the one the OP is looking at. The 505 has replaced the old 302 - both are 265 GPH. The old 304 is what you have, IIRC - 525 GPH.

I would run 2 of them (265 GPH models), or better yet one of them and one of the 370 GPH models. You really can't have too much filtration with Africans. Too, they require a lot of water movement - that's pretty important.

Avoid the UV models if at all possible - they are pretty much worthless. The bulb is no where near powerful enough to do anything at those rates of flow.