HOB FILTER MATERIAL vs Catridges

Has anyone use Polyfiber batting material in there HOB filters rather than the cartridges? I've heard that the batting is also an excellent media and is actually a little thicker, more effective, less expensive and lasts significantly longer.

If so, do you still actually need the carbon or is the batting effective enough?

Thoughts?

Alex

IMO unless your removing meds from the water column carbon should not be used in an aquarium and I use Polyfiber in all all my HOB filters.

Polyfiber will clog, so you'll want to monitor it. My ac110 runs only sponges.

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AC or Penguin Biowheel? Which one is less expensive and more effective? I've been told that AC is better even though I'm using Penguin right now.

Alex

The great thing about ACs is that the sponges last for a long time. I've replaced most of my Topfin and Aqueon HOBs (purchased when I was new in the hobby and didn't know any better) with ACs. Goodbye expensive filter replacements. Never had a biowheel HOB but filter replacements are costly over the long haul. Rinse your sponges on your ACs and you're good to go.

Andrewtfw said:

Polyfiber will clog, so you'll want to monitor it. My ac110 runs only sponges.

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A good mechanical filter is supposed to get clogged up as it catches fine. A non clogging filter is not catching fine and letting fine to bypass.

I use Penquins exclusively for my tanks and substitute cartridges with cheap poly batting I purchased from JoAnne Fabric. Marineland sells media holder for Penquin 370 to hold DIY poly pads. I need to replace about 1 square foot of poly batting each week for my big cichlid 125g. I don't run the biowheels and don't think it is necessary as there is plenty of BB in my substrate. AC is great for strong flow and biological filter but not mechanical as the sponge pores are to coarse to trap fine.

http://www.joann.com/4oz-x-48in-x-45-yd-poly-by-the-yard/9442971.html

Yup. Ditched poly/carbon type cartridges years ago. You can run a power filter with just about any combination of poly, pads, etc, with or without carbon, bio-media, etc. Anything with surface area that you put in a filter becomes bio after a while, including poly floss and carbon-- carbon as bio needs to be rinsed occasionally and will deteriorate over time, but it takes a long time.

Beneficial bacteria could care less how you label your media, they just do what they do, which is colonize any material they can attach to with available oxygen and nutrients. That doesn't mean some media aren't more efficient as bio than others, but you can run a filter with nothing but filter padding or poly floss and it will do both bio and mechanical, just rinse instead of replace and don't rinse in chlorinated water.

As mentioned above, any mechanical media clogs with time and needs rinsing out. To what extent just depends on what's ahead of it in the filter flow. You might think of sponges as primarily bio or primarily mechanical, but they do both, as will any mechanical media.

I like to use just sponges in AC's. AC's are easy to clean, easy to find replacement parts for, and easy to customize in terms of filter media. You can slip a bag of peat in there if you want, or purigen if that floats your boat. I often put a top layer of "stuff n' fluff" (purchased at a craft store) in mine to skim off fine particles after putting down new plants, changing water, or otherwise stirring up dust and gravel.

I really don't think you can beat Aqua Clear filters in terms of their longevity, accessibility, and flexibility. I also think, as filters go, they're pretty quiet.

As for Aquaclear filters I just use the sponge and then have a layer of purigen and seachem matrix. My canister filters though have the polyfiber batting in a mesh zip bag I got off eBay. Haven't had to buy filter material for around a year now since the batting was a big bag for about $6. I used to use carbon in my tanks but find that purigen makes it a lot clearer and its reusable.