The miracles of filter floss!

[lovemybarbs]

I bought some, but I think I'll put it in the extra media baskets. 8O

 

[Fishyfanatic]

I have mine shoved in a basket ontop of the pad. Works great at getting the fine particles out of the water.

 

[lovemybarbs]

Okay. I did this today. My water is usually pretty clear, but it looks even better.

 

[happygirl65]

Well this could explain why my filter flow has reduced so much....I tightly packed the media basket of my canister with filter floss that I bought from Big Al's. The flow has been majorly reduced and when I checked just two weeks later, the floss was COMPLETELY brown with gunk. I was amazed. My water is always crystal clear with this stuff. I am glad I happened onto it early on.

Thanks for posting this thread. It should have made sense to me that the floss was a major slow down since it is such an effective filter.

 

[7Enigma]

Here's an update:

I purchased a new AC20 filter (way back at Christmas time, I just never got around to installing it) for my 10 gallon QT tank to replace the whisper 10 gallon filter that I found at my parents house (I haven't had fish since I was ~13, I'm 26 now...., I was sure the piece of junk would have died by now!). It's worked OK, but clearly the AC filters are far superior.

Since I had a new filter I decided it would be perfect to take a picture of the insert packing to help people visually see what we're trying to describe. Here's a pic of the filter after being put together. Water gets pumped into the bottom (mostly) where there is a foam pad. This will remove the big junk that gets into the filter (food, fish waste, plant debris). Next is the ceramic media which will house the majority of the bacteria that converts ammonia and nitrIte to a much less toxic nitrAte. This doesn't really filter anything, just gets rid of the ammonia and nitrIte. Next is the wad of filter floss, the miracle described in this post (it's the "whitest" of the inserts). I used a small amount, probably the size of a small orange or plum. I evenly distributed it on top of the ceramic media and then smooshed the last foam pad (really only used to hold the filter floss down, but it will provide some surface for bacteria to live).

Here's what it looked like:

I now have side by side both filters which I'll keep on for a couple weeks and then remove the whisper. There's really no way to take the media from the whisper. Yes I only have snails in the tank, but I just can't do it to the little guys (ammonia poisoning)!

Here's another pic of the tank after I did some more trimming and sucked out a good bit of substrate to put in the lower tank (took doing that to realize I have WAY more substrate than I thought, just look at the bottom left corner to see the crater!). I didn't compress it as much so you can get more detail. Focus on the far back and see just how clear it is. There are some small bubbles from my CO2 PH diffusion, but practically NO FLOATING DEBRIS!

 

[locorosa]

Nice 7! Your story here inspired me to put some in my HOB. I just transferred all the kids to the new pool (35hex to 46 bowfront) and kicked up a bunch of "crap".

 

[7Enigma]

Nice 7! Your story here inspired me to put some in my HOB. I just transferred all the kids to the new pool (35hex to 46 bowfront) and kicked up a bunch of "crap".

That's how I "seeded" my new filter. I poked at some plants and used them to brush the substrate kicking up all sorts of snail poo and debris. I then turned my AC20 filter on high (way too much current for the tank) and let it run for an hour or so to suck up as much gunk as possible. While this will shorten the time between when I have to clean it next, I'd bet its almost seeded now! I'll still give it a week or two to be safe, but its a nice way to jumpstart getting the bacteria on the inserts. Oh and the tank is now the clearest its ever been, EVER.

 

[locorosa]

Well, it looks really good. I've got a triple lamp ballast on the top of the tank and other than being a different color than what I am used to, the tank looks great.
Dare I go and look at all the muck in the "floss"?

When I cycled the 92 gallon I vaccuumed up a bunch of sludge from the substrate in the 35 hex and I cycled in 16 days...never thought I'd say, "thank you goldfish poo"! Lol!

 

[7Enigma]

Just wanted to emphasize again for those of you wanting to try this with HOB filters:

Please make sure you have the filter tilted towards the tank so any overflow goes back INTO the tank and not on the floor. Please also make sure that you don't use so much floss that the top insert is flat against the top of the filter or it could also possibly leak. And most importantly,

MAKE SURE YOU HAVE YOUR TOP ON PROPERLY!

The tops on these HOB filters have an inside lip on them. This prevents any water that would run down and possibly start a leak, be it from evaporation or splashing, to go back inside the filter.

A member just had a horrible experience with a leak and I don't want anyone to suffer this!

 

[malloc]

Newbie question:
Everyone seems to have these huge fancy filters with a lot of foam & ceramic, etc, etc. stuffed in there. I'm using a whisper 20 HOB filter that came in the kit with my tank. The inserts are just thin foam sleeves that you slide over a plastic frame, pour a small amount of carbon in & slide it into the pump. Compared to the pic that was posted on page 1, i have very little filtration. Should I be putting something else in there? After reading this it makes me want to try the filter floss. Should I just cram some into the little foam sleeve with the carbon?

Also, I have been replacing the foam sleeves & carbon monthly, as suggested by the lfs. Am I losing all my good bacteria by doing this, should I be doing something different?

 

[tropicalfish]

The Whisper has a much more simple design. The Hagen AquaClear uses a special design that takes advantage of the whole filter chamber

_______________________________._______________
|                              ||    |    |    |              
| Filter stuffing here...      ||    |IN- |    |
|                              ||    |TAKE|    |
|XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX||    |TUBE|    |
|XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX||    |    |    |
|XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX||    |    |    |
|XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX||    |    |    |
|XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX||    |    |    |
|XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX||    |    |    |
|XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX||    |    |    |
|XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX ||---------------|
|XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX V|---------------|
|XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX  |_______________|
|XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX ||   |         |
|XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXxXX V| |-------------|
|XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX  | |             |
|XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX || |             | 
|XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX V| |    MOTOR    |
|XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX  | |             |
|XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX || |             |
|XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX V| |             |
|   Water flows under here     | |             |
|  and then is                 |  -------------
|  forced up...     <---  <--- | 
|______________________________|

 

[7Enigma]

Newbie question:
Everyone seems to have these huge fancy filters with a lot of foam & ceramic, etc, etc. stuffed in there. I'm using a whisper 20 HOB filter that came in the kit with my tank. The inserts are just thin foam sleeves that you slide over a plastic frame, pour a small amount of carbon in & slide it into the pump. Compared to the pic that was posted on page 1, i have very little filtration. Should I be putting something else in there? After reading this it makes me want to try the filter floss. Should I just cram some into the little foam sleeve with the carbon?

Very good questions. My personal answer is that I would recommend getting a new filter. I used the Whisper filter line for a while and was not impressed with their filtration. The AquaClear line that many of us use can be had for ~$15-20 from some online vendors (the AC20 model is what I use on my 10 gallon tank, and I have an AC50 for my 20 gallon tank, but these are both overkill for the size tank). They work extremely well.

The filter floss we are talking about is essentially the material that your calling the thin foam sleeves (unless they've changed the material they are using now). If you pull at it you'll get a strand that comes off, not unlike pulling a hair out of a comb. That's filter floss.

Also, I have been replacing the foam sleeves & carbon monthly, as suggested by the lfs. Am I losing all my good bacteria by doing this, should I be doing something different?

That's exactly what's happening and why those of us in the hobby are so agitated by the manufacturers of these filters. They make their money on the inserts they sell, not much from the actual filters. So they put these horrible schedules that essentially recycle your tank every 30 days. The new carbon protects the fish for a little while and your filter starts to repopulate with bacteria, but then it gets chucked and you're back at square one.

I had a mini whisper that was rated for 10 gallons on my 10 gallon QT tank. I NEVER replaced the filter in almost a year. NEVER. You need to do the same maintenance that those of us with canister and HOB's do. You will never spend another $ on filter components if you treat the inserts gently. Here's what you do:

-Drain some of your tank water into a bucket. I do 5 gallon PWC's and so clean my filters when they begin to clog (flow is reduced by a good bit)

-Turn off your filter and remove the insert (whisper's only have that single sleeve thing so its really easy)

-Put the insert in the USED TANK WATER (never tap water) and GENTLY shake or scrub the surface to get the debris off of it. The problem with the AC the Whisper filters use is that it can work its way through the sleeve and you don't want that. So just gently scrub at the filter. Your water in the bucket should get really funky.

-Put the insert back into the filter

-That's it!

See, basically what you are doing is removing all the large debris that is clogging the filter such as uneaten food, fish waste, and plant debris if you have live plants. All of this stuff will just sit and rot in the filter and lower the flow rate. You just simply wash this off with the tank water and its good as new. This way you keep your filter fully functional because you're not removing much of the bacteria during cleaning.

And you SAVE MONEY!

EDIT: Wanted to mention that a much better method of filtration with the Whisper filter line would be to buy some ceramic media (any will do) and replace the AC with the ceramic media. It's larger and just as porous (so lots of places for bacteria to live), and it won't come through the filter so you can clean it easier.

 

[malloc]

Tropicalfish: Thanks for the diagram. Your ASCII art skills are impressive =P

7enigma:
Thanks for the great response.

In addition to replacing the sleeves monthly, I usually gently swish the insert in old tank water during my weekly pwc's as you suggest. I will try to do as you suggest and make them last longer, but they do tend to fall apart after a while.

In my case, would adding some filter floss in with the carbon (or ceramic rings if I do get some) help at all? My water is usually just a little cloudy, would be nice if I could clear it up.

 

[tropicalfish]

Hahaha, keep in mind, that little "text" art is the view of the back of a Hagen AquaClear.

 

[7Enigma]

In my case, would adding some filter floss in with the carbon (or ceramic rings if I do get some) help at all? My water is usually just a little cloudy, would be nice if I could clear it up.

I probably wouldn't add the filter floss. Normally it just gets discarded since it gets so cruddy. I would probably just get the ceramic media and not discard the insert each time.

 

[Burks]

I use filter floss in all my filters, even canisters. Very cheap and it works well. Can't ask for much more from a product.

 

[tropicalfish]

Go to a fabric store and get those big things of polyester. Great filtering material, cheap too. Make sure you get the one that is a large piece rolled up, not a big fluff of polyester. When it is a large sheet, you can easily cut it to the shape you want.

I normally don't use the filter cover during the summer. I am actually aware of the dangers, have been too. As long as I keep the filter tilted towards the tank and maintain it often, a flood is not a worry. My parents are super energy savers--replaced all incandescents (most at least) with compact fluorescents, winter heat is set in the 60s, summer comes up to around 80, so cooling the tank somehow is a must.

 

[swanandmokashi]

I added floss to my XP3 canister last week. All I can say this week is : WOW!!!! My tank looks crystal clear ! Thanks for this thread