Trouble cycling an Eclipse 12

[neurotik]

So I've been cycling a little Eclipse 12 gallon tank for a while now so that I can set up a small tank that my mom has been asking for this summer. It has been set up for over two months now and I'm still seeing absolutely no traces of nitrites when I test the water each day. Has anyone else had this sort of experience with the Eclipse 12? I'm starting to wonder if it's something with their filter system that comes with the tank or something, I don't know at this point. I realize the process can be quite lengthy sometimes, but after over two months I would have expected to start seeing nitrites by now I think.

Any suggestions? I've thought about seeding it with some stuff from one of my canisters on my 55 gallon, but I really don't want to bother with that if I don't have to, as I'm in no real hurry to get her tank set up, I just think it's very odd that it has not begun cycling as of yet.

If anyone has any insight, let me know, thanks!

 

[mgamer20o0]

whats the ammonia level?

 

[neurotik]

Been keeping it between 6-8ppm the entire time.

 

[mgamer20o0]

wc a little keep it at 4-5. i think 8ppm ammonia is plenty high to kill off the bacteria. i would get a sponge from your canister and squeeze it into the tank a couple times. i know you are in no rush but this should fix your nitrite problems.

 

[neurotik]

Yeah, I actually did a big water change on the tank this afternoon to bring the ammonia down to around 4ish, and I'll squeeze some stuff into it from my filter tomorrow and see if that helps it out.

 

[mgamer20o0]

good place to keep it. i cant remember the exact point where ammonia will kill off the bacteria i hope someone will chime in. with a fishless cycle it tends to be 4-5 ppm in most guides.

 

[neurotik]

Just a quick update to this thread since it has been a while. I did some sponge squeezings from my established tank into the 12 gallon filter, nothing had changed after more than a week of waiting once I did that. I put a handful of gravel from my established tank in a little mesh bag and put it in the new tank as well a day ago, still nothing as of yet. I'm running out of ideas, it shouldn't be taking this many months to get this thing going. Seems really weird to me.

 

[Fromthelbc]

head to your LFS and see if they'll sell you some spare pre cultured ceramic rings. i got like 10 of'em from my LFS for 50 cents. it jumped my cycle from half to finished in a couple days.

 

[neurotik]

I've already taken established bioballs out of one of my canister filters, which would basically be the same thing as getting established ceramic rings from my LFS -- didn't do any good. I guess I can try though, I'll be near my LFS later this afternoon.

 

[neurotik]

Bumping this thread to see if anyone else has any other suggestions, or has experienced anything like this with these filters or any others and found a way around it? I've tried everything I can think of and I simply cannot get any cycling to begin in this tank. I've never had this much trouble getting a tank to cycle before, I'm stumped

 

[Mystery]

Is it possible that you have something in the tank with some kind of detergent residue on it?

 

[neurotik]

I shouldn't have any detergent residue on anything in the tank. I never used detergent to clean anything inside of it. It's pretty empty right now as well, just substrate and a little cave thing that I put in it, but it was only rinsed off with hot water, nothing else.

 

[Fromthelbc]

have you tried treating it with the bottled bacteria?

 

[neurotik]

Yup, I tried a bottled of the refrigerated Fritz stuff about a month ago, didn't seem to make any difference at all. This is really frustrating me now.

 

[neurotik]

Hate to revive this somewhat old thread, but I just thought I'd post to say that the 12 gallon tank is FINALLY cycled! I'm not sure what in the heck was making it take so long (never had a tank take this many months to finish), but I just tested the water a bit ago and to my surprise I've got 0 ammonia, 0 nitrites, and 10 nitrates!

The only change I made since the last post where I had pretty much ran out of options was that I did some water changes to bring down the ammonia levels in the tank to around 1ppm, and then I tried to keep it around there for the past few days. Not sure if that made a difference or not, but at least it is finally cycled

Going to go out with my girlfriend tomorrow and try to decide what I want to put in it. It's funny how I'm just as excited about this tank cycling as I was when my very first tank had finally cycled. I love this hobby!!

 

[hacket]

Haha, it is an awesome hobby. Glad to hear it finally worked for you!