There are a lot of plans for building trickle filters on the net, so, not being one to follow, I had to take a few ideas from others and then re-invent the wheel anyway!
I liked the 5 gal bucket trickle filter, as it seems very compact, while still providing a very large bio-media capacity.
This plan however, had some bugs, namely a self-rotating spray bar that trickled water over the bio-media.
I don�t know how it�s working for the author, but I couldn�t see it lasting very long after a good sludge of bacteria and algae grew inside of it.
Other �bio-tower� designed call for a �drip-plate�, in which dozens of tiny holes are drilled allowing for water to trickle over the bio-media. This idea probably works well, but those tiny holes will gloss over with sludge too, and the plate requires too much room, imho for a compact filter.
My solution was to build a circular spray loop, center fed via two paths. I constructed the loop from 8x �� cpvc 45� elbows and 3x �� cpvc tee�s, connected together with short pieces of �� cpvc pipe (cpvc is the yellow stuff, genova I think). Water enters the first tee through the lid of the filter, where a valve connects it with the overflow (see my diy overflow post). This tee feeds two more tees connected via short pieces of pipe. These tees are then joined into a ring constructed of the eight elbows and more short pieces of pipe. Holes are drilled in all of the pipe pieces, using a 1/8� drill bit.
I didn�t weld any of this together, so I can pop it apart every few months and run a bottle brush through to clear the sludge.
(insert ascii art diagram here � pff, octagon�s are too hard to draw with ascii (anyone want to take a stab?))
This loop sprays �dirty� water onto about a 2� mat of filter floss (additional pre-filter), which covers about 20 plastic scouring pads (the roundish woven plastic kind). The pads should provide ample bio-area, and they�re all I had available (out of 5 local gun shops, no-one had shot-gun wadding!) At $0.45 for 3, they�re pretty darned cheap! These pads sit on-top of a plastic colander which was trimmed and inverted, wedged into the bottom of the bucket. Under the colander there is about 3� deep by 12� round free space as a �sump� that contains a MaxiJet 1000 pump, which returns water to the aquarium via a �� bulkhead in the side of the bucket. There is probably room for a pair of 50 watt submersible heaters, or a co2 diffuser, but I don�t know about putting hot things in a plastic bucket, and adding co2 to a biological filter might be counter productive as far as the aerobic bacteria are concerned.
The hardest parts of this project were building the spray-loop and finding suitable bio-media. Now that I�ve gotten my overflow working correctly, this filter should provide PLENTY of bio-filtration for my 30 gallon tank (maybe 45 gal soon), snatching up any bio matter that the plants didn�t grab first.
I may build another one to filter a 90 gallon pond (in ground), but instead of gravity feed in, pump out, I�ll make it pump in, gravity feed out. It should keep the goldfish happy.
Ttyl
Gordon
I liked the 5 gal bucket trickle filter, as it seems very compact, while still providing a very large bio-media capacity.
This plan however, had some bugs, namely a self-rotating spray bar that trickled water over the bio-media.
I don�t know how it�s working for the author, but I couldn�t see it lasting very long after a good sludge of bacteria and algae grew inside of it.
Other �bio-tower� designed call for a �drip-plate�, in which dozens of tiny holes are drilled allowing for water to trickle over the bio-media. This idea probably works well, but those tiny holes will gloss over with sludge too, and the plate requires too much room, imho for a compact filter.
My solution was to build a circular spray loop, center fed via two paths. I constructed the loop from 8x �� cpvc 45� elbows and 3x �� cpvc tee�s, connected together with short pieces of �� cpvc pipe (cpvc is the yellow stuff, genova I think). Water enters the first tee through the lid of the filter, where a valve connects it with the overflow (see my diy overflow post). This tee feeds two more tees connected via short pieces of pipe. These tees are then joined into a ring constructed of the eight elbows and more short pieces of pipe. Holes are drilled in all of the pipe pieces, using a 1/8� drill bit.
I didn�t weld any of this together, so I can pop it apart every few months and run a bottle brush through to clear the sludge.
(insert ascii art diagram here � pff, octagon�s are too hard to draw with ascii (anyone want to take a stab?))
This loop sprays �dirty� water onto about a 2� mat of filter floss (additional pre-filter), which covers about 20 plastic scouring pads (the roundish woven plastic kind). The pads should provide ample bio-area, and they�re all I had available (out of 5 local gun shops, no-one had shot-gun wadding!) At $0.45 for 3, they�re pretty darned cheap! These pads sit on-top of a plastic colander which was trimmed and inverted, wedged into the bottom of the bucket. Under the colander there is about 3� deep by 12� round free space as a �sump� that contains a MaxiJet 1000 pump, which returns water to the aquarium via a �� bulkhead in the side of the bucket. There is probably room for a pair of 50 watt submersible heaters, or a co2 diffuser, but I don�t know about putting hot things in a plastic bucket, and adding co2 to a biological filter might be counter productive as far as the aerobic bacteria are concerned.
The hardest parts of this project were building the spray-loop and finding suitable bio-media. Now that I�ve gotten my overflow working correctly, this filter should provide PLENTY of bio-filtration for my 30 gallon tank (maybe 45 gal soon), snatching up any bio matter that the plants didn�t grab first.
I may build another one to filter a 90 gallon pond (in ground), but instead of gravity feed in, pump out, I�ll make it pump in, gravity feed out. It should keep the goldfish happy.
Ttyl
Gordon
