k, Ive had these tanks set up for over 6 months, they each have a ugf as well as additional filtration. My 20 gallon stand has an opening, i assume so you can see the underside of te tank....In the beginning i would check the bottom of that one at each water change and it always was fine, clean, etc. i stopped looking under there until last night, and eek! there was a layer of fine poops and stuff underthere. I dont think it was TOO much, I could still see through some parts, but how do I clean this out? This must be why people dont like undergravels....Id almost prefer to remove them, but thats so much hassle....
cleaning undergravel filter
- Thread starter TheZoo
- Start date
you can try vac thru the gravell..also you may be able to feed something thru the uplift tube and vac some of the mulm out.
are you doing regular gravel vac's?
I can get most of the 'crap' mulm out of the ugf when I vac..but I have since upgraded to rfug..
are you doing regular gravel vac's?
I can get most of the 'crap' mulm out of the ugf when I vac..but I have since upgraded to rfug..
You definatly want to clean that out, I no longer use UGF's due to that problem. I have also had them go very bad in a short period of time no matter how much I vaced the gravel. Both times I had them it was at one year that they blew up and took out my fish. Now that being said I did not run a small tube down the uplift tube and try to vac out the sludge (never thought of it). But no matter what you do you should definatly clean that.
yes, i do weekly gravel vacs, enough to take out approx. 25-35% of water. I guess Ill try to feed something down the uplift tubes, since obviously gravel vaccing isnt doing too much! I wonder if it will work if i just remove the head part and stick the stiff part of the gravel vac over the tube? But I shudder to think what it would look like had I NOT been doing the gravel vacing... When I do remove the UGFs (we will be moving an afew months, might as well do it then), is there anything I should be aware of? I will be basically tearing down the tank completely. I know not to rinse out the gravel, but is there anything else? I may also work on installing a 3D background then.
Hello, I am newer to the hobby so anyone correct me if I am wrong but using a RUGF will help. I currently use a RUGF and a HOB and the combo of both work well for me. I also have a 20g tank if this help. The RUGF pushes everything up and the HOB sucks it out. When I do water changes/Gravel cleaning I have noticed there is alot less crap sitting there to get out. My fish seem to really like this system also as it adds a slight current to my system. I also wanted to add I do have a couple live plants in my system and they do well with the RUGF. I use 2 Penguin 660R units in my tank. Just thought I would add my 2 cents for ya.
yeah, i did think about converitng to a RUGF, but how much money would I have to shell out to do this? Im pretty broke these days.
The other option you have is when you break down your tank to remove the UGF. You will need to have another filtration system. That is what I did, but it is your choice what you want to do. Read up on UGF's, RUGF's, and NO UGF and see what will work best for you. Be forwarned that there is a lot of information about the UGF and some people say they are great some say they stink. I used to say they are great, now I say they are not for me (I had 2 bad experiences with them on two different setups and lost a lot of fish). I run other filtration and my fish are happy and healthy.
Oh yeah you can rinse the gravel in tank water and keep it in a clean bucket with a little water in it. Also try to keep your decorations and plants (assuming fake) in the same water. I am assuming a relatively quick re-setup... If it will be a while before you are going to re-setup the tank then there is no use trying to save any of the bacteria.