# advice on the filters



## Happi (28 Feb 2012)

am looking forward to replace my 2x rena xp2 filters. i think my rena aren't putting enough flow in my 50g (USA) tank.

either 2 of these:
http://www.ebay.com/itm/Odyssea-CFS-500 ... 19cd98c9a6

or 2 of these:

http://thefishhub.com/Store/Product/aqu ... ter_filter


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## ceg4048 (28 Feb 2012)

Hi,
   These seem like great inexpensive alternatives to the name brands. Strong pumps in plastic buckets are always exciting and should work well. I'd connect them to spraybars mounted along the full length of the back wall. Since they are Far East knockoffs of name brands the only worry would be about the material quality - primarily the plastic fittings and attach hardware so just be careful and avoid knocking them about. You can also add more substantial filter media such as sintered glass to give you better biofiltration - but at the cost of reduced flow rate.

Cheers,


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## Happi (28 Feb 2012)

thanks for your advice brother

is it ok to put the outflow and inflow on the same side inside the tank? or should i put the inflow on the left side and outflow on the rightside? 

wouldn't adding both of the filters inflow on the same side cause problems?


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## ceg4048 (28 Feb 2012)

Hi mate,
         No, there should not be any problem. It doesn't really matter where you put the inlets. I mean, obviously you don't want the two orifices touching each other, which would affect the suction of both, but generally, there are no practical disadvantages to having the inlets placed on the same side. It's the outlets placement and arrangement that will have a stronger impact on success/failure because it's the way the outflow energy reaches the plants that makes all the difference in the world. Place the intakes wherever you find it most convenient.

Cheers,


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## Happi (28 Feb 2012)

thanks bro

i also dont like to add any media in the filter, i thought it will reduce the effect of fertilizers. in my current filter, it does not have sponge or media, it only have DIY sponge on the inflow inside the tank to block any junk from entering in the filter. i was trying to increase the flow and want most out of the fertilizers. what do you think about this.


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## hinch (28 Feb 2012)

the 2nd ones are the resun/sunsun pumps resold in the uk under the allpondsolutions brand (don't know about in yankee land since both sites were american I assume you're from there)

they can be found cheaper than you listed above on ebay in higher flow rates than the one you listed.  spares are easy to get hold of and cheap however don't expect the flow rate to be as described from experience and extensive testing of the entire range of those pumps expect actual flow rate to be round about 50% lower than listed


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## ceg4048 (29 Feb 2012)

Happi said:
			
		

> i also dont like to add any media in the filter, i thought it will reduce the effect of fertilizers. in my current filter, it does not have sponge or media, it only have DIY sponge on the inflow inside the tank to block any junk from entering in the filter. i was trying to increase the flow and want most out of the fertilizers. what do you think about this.


There is absolutely no relationship between  media in the filter and the performance of the fertilizers - unless you are using a chemical media which targets a specific nutrient of course. Having said that, the bacteria that grow in the sponges and in other types of media do consume nutrients, so the more bacteria you have, the more nutrients they consume, but this is such a paltry amount in the overall scheme of things, and the benefit of having high bacterial populations is so good, that it really doesn't matter.

As mentioned, more media means more drag and therefore more flow restriction, but you don't have to fill the bucket with media. Sintered glass, activated carbon, alfagrog are all excellent media choices and a little of each goes a long way. If you're using two of these strong filters on a 50G then you easily have room to spare.

Cheers,


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## Happi (5 Mar 2012)

hey bro,

i just installed one of the 500gph filter today, installed with the 20" long spraybar. i will have another filter next week installed, i should have total of 1000gph on the filters, but lets say i will have 500gph total from both, giving me 10x the flow in my 50g. i will have both of them hooked up to the same spraybar. so i would have 40" long spraybar.

what do you think about that? anyway filters came with sponges but no media, am sure sponges will have many bacteria to grow, so should i avoid adding any extra media? which can reduce the flow. 

i also use http://greenleafaquariums.com/co2-diffu ... er-75.html this diffuser, so where should be the best placement for it in my tank? please help me setup this whole thing correctly this time. i dont want to waste my money on useless things again.


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## ceg4048 (5 Mar 2012)

Well, the 10X rule was developed already taking into account the fact that filters only deliver about 50% of their rated flow, so one never has to do any additional calculations. A single 500GPH filter covers the 10X rule. So really, with two similarly rated filters like these you will actually have 20X flow, which is fine. The more flow, the better, however it can turn your tank into a washing machine so that fish such as angels, discus or other higher surface area or high finnage fish might find it rough going.

You can mount the diffuser below the spraybars on the back wall near the bottom. On the page link you gave, if you look at the very bottom of the page the is a better unit on the far lef, refered to as an "inline" unit. These are much better as they are mounted outside the tank and do a better job because they inject the gas into the filter outlet water stream. Since you already have the in tank unit they just mount it far below the spraybars centrally as I mentioned.

Cheers,


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## Happi (11 Mar 2012)

thanks for your help

i got the both of the filter installed and this is how i set it up, please take a look and let me know if this is correctly setup.


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## ceg4048 (11 Mar 2012)

Yeah, this is about as good as it gets mate. If you're using a solenoid then turn the gas on an hour or even 2 hours before the lights go on and adjust the bubble rate so that by the time the lights come on the dropchecker is lime green (the inside of the lime).

Cheers,


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## Happi (11 Mar 2012)

thanks brother,

i will be heading to the store to get a new timer right now, so i can turn on the co2 2 hours before the lights. before i just had it turn on with the lights.

thanks again, hopefully my plants will show the improvment. any idea how long it will take for the plants to respond?


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## ceg4048 (12 Mar 2012)

Very difficult to say mate. Depends on the plants - fast growers respond faster than slow growers, depends on whether you have actually achieved good flow distribution, and depends on the injection rate. Turning on the gas earlier will have a huge impact. Normally you should see improvements within a week or so. What should happen almost immediately is that any browning, melting or other CO2 related faults should come to a halt, but you may not see significant growth acceleration until the plants have built up enough food reserves.

Cheers,


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## Happi (21 Mar 2012)

update

the plants did not show any improvement, panantal still drops its lower leaves and continue to do so. foreground plants aren't growing either, dosing EI and running 2 of those diffusers along with cerges co2 reactor, now that is allot of co2 in the tank. 

i guess i will have to change the flow again, i will trying adding both inflow on the same side while keeping everything else same. lets see what will happen next.

do you have a video of your setup bro? maybe i will get an better idea.


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## ceg4048 (23 Mar 2012)

Hi mate,
           No I don't have video capability but you can see still images in the thread http://www.ukaps.org/forum/viewtopic.php?f=38&t=1167

The holes in the spraybars should face exactly horizontally.

Just for confirmation, are you using distilled water adjusted to 4dKH in the dropchecker?
What color is the DC when the lights come on?

If you have two of the CO2 diffusers, what you should do is try placing one of each just under each of the filter inlets so that the filters are sucking up the gas so that the filters process the gas. Try it and see. Leave the plumbing as shown on your diagram on page 1.

Take sample pH reading of the tank every hour or 1/2 hour from when you turn the gas on to when you tun the gas off and report the values.

Cheers,


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## Happi (24 Mar 2012)

thanks bro, 

i dont trust the DC, it always showed green. only blue after 2-3 hours if i take it out of the tank. otherwise its always green in the tank. yes am also using 4dkh

here the water parameter:

KH 0-0.5
GH 2-4 range
PH 6.2 (last time i tested)

dosing EI and 3tsp GH booster once a week with water changes. using 100% RO water

i will try my best to get the spray bar straight as possible, but in one of your post you said that you point your spraybar slightly upward.


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## ceg4048 (24 Mar 2012)

OK, so listen very carefully, because what's happening is that you are discarding bits and pieces of information and choosing what things to absorb. This gives you an incomplete picture and severely hampers troubleshooting.

We do not care about what the parameters were "the last time you tested", because that tells us absolutely nothing. What we're requesting is for you to to take pH readings over the course of the photoperiod and report all the values from sunrise to sunset. So if your photoperiod is 8 hours long then we need to get at least 8 evenly spaced pH readings. 16 evenly spaced pH readings would be even better, but 8 will be sufficient. This data will tell us just exactly how effective your CO2 technique is because CO2 drives the pH in the tank.

The DC is also a pH test kit and so it's colors should vaguely reflect the pH trend in the tank that you will measure.

It could easily be that although you think that you have a lot of CO2, you might actually not have a lot. That's what we need to find out, and the only way to find out is to take multiple, "time-lapse" pH readings in the tank. 

Forget about everything else. Leave the tubes, diffusers  and everything else where they are as shown on your page 1 sketch and take the measurements. Then, we will make a change to something and subsequently, take the measurements again to see if the change that was made was effective. You have to be systematic and methodical, because CO2 is very complicated, and we are all separated by hundreds or even thousands of miles, so we cannot see things clearly enough to solve the problem. These measurements give us the information we need to suggest a course of action, but only if we are disciplined enough to make small changes from a known configuration - and so we have to know exactly what the configuration looks like, otherwise it becomes a lottery, get it?

Cheers,


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