how often to clean AC filters?

Linda S

Linda S

AC Members
Sep 6, 2009
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Killeen, TX
Real Name
Linda Sholly
:( one of my Aqua Clear filters was making LOTS of noise, so I took one that I am no longer using and replaced it. moved the media to the "new" one and decided to see what was wrong. EEEWWWW! It was all gunked up! There must have been a 1/4 inch of muck caked on it. Which leads me to my question. How often should I be taking these bad boys apart and really giving them a good cleaning with the toothbrush and q-tips?
 
I use to do it every 4-6 weeks, I use prefilters on the intakes now and the housing and motor stay pretty clean now just the intake tubes I still need to give frequent cleanings to.
 
It all depends on your biological load, some tanks stay much cleaner than others. I notice the tanks with lots of driftwood tend to get a lot more mucky than tanks that are just rock based...and planted tanks (depending on the plants, really) can often times get a lot of goo in the filter as well. I love my 55 gallon "log" tank but it always looks dirty with little bits of stuff stuck to everything, I think because the giant oak branch that's in there is slowly dissolving. The fish sure love it, though.

Do you have a dishwasher? You can just put the whole filter, minus the motor, in there :) The media can be squeezed clean in a bucket of aquarium water, which I'd do maybe once a month or two.
 
I see a lot of folks write that they only service their filters after several months or the flow dramatically reduces.
Stop and think of what happens to detritus trapped by the filter. It rapidly decays and with all the rushing water, quickly becomes 'manure tea' - dissolved organics that pollute the water column unless you use an organic scavenger (like Purigen) or a protein skimmer (in SW).
IMO, we would be better off to service filters very frequently (at least weekly) to remove detritus and rinse or replace media.
The need for [sometimes large] weekly water changes is simply that we do not filter/purify water well enough.
 
You think the filters should be cleaned weekly? That is radical thinking. Even the manufacturers of those cartridge filters don't recommend that kind of frequency, with Tetra and Marineland recommending once a month. I'm sure you don't use cartridges (as I don't, except to use them up when the filter is new) and probably have alternating filters, however I don't see a great benefit to cleaning the filter this frequently. One week old filter media is hardly dirty at all in a reasonably stocked tank. Additionally, in a tank with only one filter, I can see the beneficial bacteria being upset by being rinsed four times a month.

The media we use does filter out some dissolved organics (the ones we can test for) but definitely not all...hormones and metabolites are still in the water column until they are diluted with fresh water. Refreshing the water frequently also adds back the carbonate salts an aquarium needs for stability. Also, frequent water changes trigger breeding in many species. So there is definitely more to it beyond just purifying water.
 
While I do think a week is to often to clean most filters, I do agree they can accumulate alot of gunk in a week. As I said in my earlier post I use prefilters and have to squeeze and rinse them twice a week, if I let them go for a week the flow would stop. I'm always amazed at how dirty and how many times I have to squeeze them out after just a few days.
 
Hmm, doesn't that make you kind of nervous? Sometimes life happens and I'd be uncomfortable with having a setup that needed my attention twice a week, and without it would stop functioning.

I run 10 aquariums currently, so my filters can get pretty dirty. All tanks over 20 gallons run two forms of filtration, so I have over a dozen filters to maintain. I have never lost a fish to a dirty filter. I have had a filter stop working for days (without my knowledge) and had everything be just fine. That said, I feed only once a day and keep plants in most of my tanks.

In my humble opinion, I think having a more carefree setup is a more realistic and sustainable approach to the hobby...burnout is inevitable when you overcomplicate matters. The filtration that we use today is so much more advanced than when this hobby was in its infancy. In general, our tanks are better run, better stocked (because of better advice being readily available) and enjoy water changes much more frequently. You don't have to be obsessive to have healthy aquariums...things can be so much easier now than they ever were, in terms of success to effort ratio :)
 
If I'm going to be away from home even if its just a day or two I'll take them off the filters, I run 2 filters as well. I started using the prefilters to keep my shrimplets and plant matter from getting sucked up, along with the occasional fry and snail. I wouldn't do it if I had several tanks going with the same setup but I'm only running 2 freshwater tanks now. The added benefit of just squeezing out the prefilters is I only have to clean the media in the filter every 4 weeks or so and its literally just a quick dip in the old water for the biomedia, and 2 squeezings of the sponge, along with the purigen recharge every couple months which is when I'll also take the hob's off and clean them out in the sink.
 
Well it only takes me about 5 minutes (only cause I 'dog it') to rinse the media from my AC70 filter during the weekly water change...which I've cut back to 10g on my 60g tank (5g/50% DI water). I am periodically using activated carbon and Seachem Purigen to better filter/purify the water. I often totally swap out the media entirely as I have a dedicated bio-filter and want to use the AC70 as mechanical/chemical only.
I don't see this 5 minutes as a burden that will cause burnout and it reduces some resulting dissolved organics that would result in unwanted nitrates.
 
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