I dont use Commercial media either. all i have is Eheim Efhisubstrat Pro cause i got a killer deal on it. I use Poly-Fil for mechanical and Quilt Batting for polishing.
Bio-wheel effectiveness?
- Thread starter Jspigs
- Start date
there is over 2 miles of area on a bio wheel pro thirty. MOST bio wheels are smaller than those though . i am talking about the ones that come with the mag 250 for up to fifty gallons. there is also a good website that has resources for sponge filters that will tell you there that a sponge filter is better than a bio wheel but of course with everything else it is mostly personal experience since every aquarium is different and each fish keeper has different maintenance habits such as feeding an cleaning. you should and will get answers from both sides though
BettaFishMommy
finkids make me happy :-)
i think 2 miles is a 'bit' of an overstatement. but there is a lot of surface area. consider taking the pleated fabric off a biowheel and stretching it out. consider both sides of the now flat sheet and also consider all the minute areas of surface area between the two layers (from what i can tell my biowheel is two layers of the 'fabric').
seems like more area for bacteria but they clog and stall fast and you have to replace them. i never used them or plan to use them.
I am certain they may help but I disagree that they are imperative to have. I have had them stop completely without any sort of repercussion from it.
I have other HOB's that have no media for bio use and tank is just as clear and clean as the tanks with a bio media system. Overall, I think anything that can add to O2 to the water is a good thing but based on mass surface area, I feel it is more hype than help.
I have other HOB's that have no media for bio use and tank is just as clear and clean as the tanks with a bio media system. Overall, I think anything that can add to O2 to the water is a good thing but based on mass surface area, I feel it is more hype than help.
BettaFishMommy
finkids make me happy :-)
whenever mine get a little gunked up i just dunk them repeatedly in a bucket of tank water to knock off most of the debris. if there are sections that are really gross i'll rub it off with my fingers. might have to do this 3 or 4 times a year at most. never see any change in tank parameters (ammonia/nitrite wise) or changes in fish behaviour due to my biowheel cleaning method. been running this filter for at least a year and a half with the same original biowheels.
i've read about NEVER touching the biowheels on a filter but if they are not turning or are all slimy with goo then they aren't effective and something needs to be done to return them to working order. rinsing and rubbing in tank water seems to me the better solution than completely replacing all that bacteria laden surface area.
I like this. I've also had a mag 350 pro for about a year and a half now and I've never touched the bio-wheels and there still chuggin along. Never stopped. They slowed down significantly the first few months I had them, but have been at the same slow speed for a while now.
Hey All
We (well it's not we anymore now so I am not doing PR for marineland, I'll just try to explain the concept!) actually had an independent lab test and compare the BioWheel penguins to other popular filters and the Biowheel came out on top. They are not a gimmick which was a comment made when they first came out.
Until the Biowheel was developed almost all filters had the mechanical filter double as the biological filter. Whether it was a pad, a sponge or whatever. I came to marineland from the commercial aquaculture industry - we never would do that. Why? Because when you clog up your biofilter (which will happen because it is also the mechanical filter) the nitrifying bacteria get smothered and also do not have access to the ammonia and the nitrite in the water. The whole point of the Biowheel was to separate the biofilter from the mechanical filter - that way you could clean and/or change the mechanical filter as often as you wanted and not worry about throwing away the nitrifiers. And the nitrifiers were now not in danger of being covered with grunge and overgrown with heterotrophic bacteria. Further the rotating action of the Biowheel keeps the nitrifier biofilm very thin which allows good and fast exchange between the bacteria and ammonia/nitrite in the water.
The secret to a good biofilter is keeping the biofilm thin. In the attached figure
look how thin the zone of nitrifying activity is - 100 microns!! (Note this is not my work PM if you want the reference). Think it - almost all biofilters are clogged with junk so how is oxygen and ammonia/nitrite suppose to get to the bacteria. The media may have a lot surface area but it is useless if covered with grunge.
So the biowheel solved a few problem: 1) separate out the mechanical from the biological 2) keep the biofilm thin by self-cleaning, 3) get maximum interchange with air so there is a lot of oxygen available to the nitrifiers.
Hope this helps
We (well it's not we anymore now so I am not doing PR for marineland, I'll just try to explain the concept!) actually had an independent lab test and compare the BioWheel penguins to other popular filters and the Biowheel came out on top. They are not a gimmick which was a comment made when they first came out.
Until the Biowheel was developed almost all filters had the mechanical filter double as the biological filter. Whether it was a pad, a sponge or whatever. I came to marineland from the commercial aquaculture industry - we never would do that. Why? Because when you clog up your biofilter (which will happen because it is also the mechanical filter) the nitrifying bacteria get smothered and also do not have access to the ammonia and the nitrite in the water. The whole point of the Biowheel was to separate the biofilter from the mechanical filter - that way you could clean and/or change the mechanical filter as often as you wanted and not worry about throwing away the nitrifiers. And the nitrifiers were now not in danger of being covered with grunge and overgrown with heterotrophic bacteria. Further the rotating action of the Biowheel keeps the nitrifier biofilm very thin which allows good and fast exchange between the bacteria and ammonia/nitrite in the water.
The secret to a good biofilter is keeping the biofilm thin. In the attached figure
look how thin the zone of nitrifying activity is - 100 microns!! (Note this is not my work PM if you want the reference). Think it - almost all biofilters are clogged with junk so how is oxygen and ammonia/nitrite suppose to get to the bacteria. The media may have a lot surface area but it is useless if covered with grunge.
So the biowheel solved a few problem: 1) separate out the mechanical from the biological 2) keep the biofilm thin by self-cleaning, 3) get maximum interchange with air so there is a lot of oxygen available to the nitrifiers.
Hope this helps
