Aquaclear 20 for filtration

Basically anything that bacteria stick to...personally I use a coarse sponge along with pillow stuffing. And only rinse one or the other out every couple of weeks...but there are many things you can stick in your aquaclear just as long as it has good surface area for the bacteria.

Baadboy11 said:

Basically anything that bacteria stick to...personally I use a coarse sponge along with pillow stuffing. And only rinse one or the other out every couple of weeks...but there are many things you can stick in your aquaclear just as long as it has good surface area for the bacteria.

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Ok. Thanks for your help. It leads me to another question. Does driftwood or stones in the tank help with biological filtration? I'm guessing yes...

look into the eheim 2211 or 2213 for filtration. the ceramic rings help a lot with the bacteria colonization. bacteria will pretty much stick anywhere but they prefer perforated surfaces like ceramic rings and such. with dealing with such a small filter though you are somewhat limited.

rickztahone said:

look into the eheim 2211 or 2213 for filtration. the ceramic rings help a lot with the bacteria colonization. bacteria will pretty much stick anywhere but they prefer perforated surfaces like ceramic rings and such. with dealing with such a small filter though you are somewhat limited.

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I really know nothing about canister filters. Coming from the reefing world I've been led to believe that these things were on their way out! I had no idea that they were still in such wide use until I found this site. I can't really afford to spend nearly $100 on a new canister filter. However, a reefing friend is getting out of the hobby entirely and has a Fluval 205 canister filter for sale for $50. Would this be a good buy?

I had an aquaclear20 on a 10gallon for a good year. It worked fairly well, the water was clear enough (except for the tannins from aquasoil). I just used the stock media minus the carbon (not good for planted tanks). I added a little pouch of Purigen in its place and this definitely helped with water quality. I eventually added another aquaclear20 which in my opinion was perfect for the 10 gallon tank. There was plenty of flow throughout the tank which aides in algae prevention, and helps disperse co2.

Canisters are nice because the outflow is adjustable so you can put it below the water line and not have lots of surface agitation. Surface agitation does release some of the co2 from the water.

But I don't like the film that develops on the water surface without surface agitation so a little co2 loss isn't that big of a deal to me, I just up the co2 bubbles per minute and my plants grow fine.

Clavius said:

Ok. Thanks for your help. It leads me to another question. Does driftwood or stones in the tank help with biological filtration? I'm guessing yes...

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yep your correct, driftwood, stones and your substrate will all house beneficial bacteria. And I think that aquaclear will suit you just fine.

Canisters aren't that great for saltwater. You guys can use sumps which are much better than canisters, but since planted tanks use co2 which dissipates with water disturbance, using a sump would make a lot of the co2 come out of the water.

A canister is basically a contained sump. Another reason they are bad for saltwater is because while they are good at catching particulate waste, they don't remove it from the system, so it stays there and leads to higher nitrates which you guys don't want. With planted tanks its no problem since the plants consume nitrate and we add extra nitrate anyway...

I've used Ac20's quite a bit on 10g tanks. They do an adequate job IMO.

I just ran them stuffed with the foam inserts for the most part. Occasionally I'd add some floss when needed.