The Planted Tank Forum banner

What can a Vortex D-1 Diatom Filter do in 6 hours ?

7K views 9 replies 7 participants last post by  Jimmyblues 
#1 ·



I thought I would post these "endview" photos of my 75 gallon for those of you that have never seen diatomaceous filtering in action.

During last weeks maintenance I decided it was time to clean a filter but I ended up doing both of them. I rarely clean both filters at the same time in my tank. The water in my tank was clouding up bad ever since.
I dusted off the diatom filter and ran it for 6 hours this afternoon and here are the results...

Any other questions ? :lol:
 
See less See more
2
#4 ·
This filter isnt something that you would run all the time, which I guess would make it pricy, but there is not a bacterial or algal bloom (gw) that it will not remove in a day or 2. Professional tank maintenance people use these things quite often to polish the water in show tanks.
I have not seen seachems version so I cant tell you if it does the same but any filter that uses de as a media will surely take out the finest of particles from the water. As far as nutrient loss, again, I cant tell ya yes or no cause I just dont know how it could be checked.
I recently setup a 10 gallon with a 55 watt pc over it just for a few extra plants to hold and it had bad green water from my laziness... I threw the filter on it also yesterday and in 45 minutes it cleaned it out and crystalized the water. :wink:

I had a buddy that was a non believer in these filters and thought his water was crystal clear so I brought the D-1 over his house and we ran it for 4 hours while we tested the temperature and quality of his beer and he was amazed at how the water just shined when it was done.

As you can see in the photos above, thats 4 feet of tank you are looking through and you can see how clear the water is after just a short amount of time.
 
#6 ·
i loved the look of this, so i decided to diy a diatom filter, its just a tube, 2 end caps and a jay cloth for a gauze, then lots of crushed ehiem substrat, ya know the sintered glass stuff...
is this what is normaly used when a carbon block isnt used?. ive just set it running and im gonna give it 6ish hours to see if its done anything,
 
#10 ·
Vortex D1 Will IOnly Offer Temporary Relief From Algae Blooms

Heh.. seeing as my 135 Gallon tank has just turned into green soup.. I think I'll pick one of these up.

I've got my eye on the XL model of the Vortex.. I like the 400gph instead of the 150 gph.. that would take forever to filter the 135 gallon tank....



After I began using hightech lighting systems for my aquariums, while also adding fertilizer and injected CO2, the tanks began to suffer from chronic algae problems.

Using my Vortex D1 would clear the tanks' water columns, however, a few days later the water had started turning green again.

The solution has been to add uv sterilizers to these aquariums, which keep the water looking as crystal clear as it does after just running a diatom filter.

I keep the uv sterilizers on a timer so that they come on with the lights and go off at night. This has worked quite well at keeping the water in each of my four planted aquariums crystal clear, and has made the use of the Vortex largely redundant.

However, I still use the D1 from time to time just to give the tanks that last measure of cleaning, since nothing filters water better than diatomaceaus earth.

I have read of many aquarists describing how they can't seem to get the water in their planted aquariums clear, regardless of what they do.

A uv sterilizer is the logical solution. And because a uv sterilizer reduces the amount of algae and bacteria in the water column, your plants are able to grow quicker, since they have access to nutrients that the algae and bacteria would otherwise be feeding on.
 
This is an older thread, you may not receive a response, and could be reviving an old thread. Please consider creating a new thread.
Top