Air Driven Fishroom Question??

[fishman09]

So I've been contemplating doing an upgrade and centralize and streamline the filtration in my fishroom by running a single air pump and sponges to all the tanks. I stock lightly with large CA/SA cichlids (1 fish or pair per tank) and have all my tanks hooked to a drip system. The tanks are 225, 150, 135, 75, 55, 29, 20 and all get 80%+ changed via the drip weekly.


My main concern is will the sponges be able to handle the bio load of the big cichlids? Some of them may get as large as 18-24" so they will produce their fair amount of waste and i want my water quality to stay the same as it is now which is darn near perfect. If the sponges will handle that then i would love to switch as it will save massively on electric and make maintenance of the filtration much easier for me. What I have now works just fine so no pressure to change but I really like the idea of running the entire fishroom on air and cut running costs, but dont want to sacrifice anything in terms of filtration.

Heres what i was thinking...

225:4 Hydor V (Umbee pair)
150:4 Hydor V (solo Dovii male)
135:3 Hydor V (6 juvie Excich. Beani)
75: 2 Hydor V (solo male red devil)
55: 2 Hydor V (growout tank)
29: 1 Hydor V (Fry tank 1-2")
20: 1 Hydor IV (fry <1")

Thanks.

 

[Miguel]

I find that to use those filter sponges is insufficient with your monsters, depending however on the amount you deip daily.

For air pumps you can get those big ones, who easiliy service 15 tanks ( i have 2; best buys i have made ), that are usually used by the killi guys.

No noise, authentic workhorses.

 

[skjl47]

Hello; Sponge filters have the limitation of not being able to trap the detritus physically in a filter medium that can be washed or discarded. I have taken old sponge filters out from time to time and washed them out but this does not address the issue of detritus /mulm build up.
Using a siphon during water changes can help to remove some of the detritus.

I have some survivor air powered filters from the 1970's that function like a HOB filter. They have a space where I can place charcoal, filter floss or other such media. They run on air bubbles that carry water up a tube and out of the tank into the filter body which hangs on the back of the tank.
There are some issues compared to the current HOB power filters. The water flow is likely to be much smaller. The water level must be kept high in a tank to allow the bubble lift to work at maximum efficiency. The advantage is that they run on air and with a stout air pump a number of these could be run along with the sponge filters. I have run many tanks this way with only air powered filtration. With moderate stocking and care to prevent overfeeding such a setup has worked well for me.

I have a survivor in operation on a tank now. I had some excess air to bleed off and decided to retrieve a unit from one of my storage boxes. The issue may be finding such air powered filter units as I have not seen any on sale anywhere in a long time.
There were two styles as I recall. One, as already described, had a tube inside the tank that carried water and bubbles up and above the rim of the tank and then thru a box hanging on the back. The water flowed back into the tank by gravity thru slots built into the filter box.

The other type used siphon tubes to draw water from the tank into a box outside the tank. Some sort of bubbler arrangement was then used to push the water back into the tank after it passed thru the filter medium. An advantage to this type was that the flow was not affected by the water level in the tank. A problem was starting a siphon, for which some clever accessories were made.

I guess some sort of homemade version of such a filter could be made.

 

[Squirtle919]

why not build a side filter thats air driven? this way you can add your matrix or bio media in and your mech why running the room off one pump?

Its the most popular method for running fish shops-fish rooms here as your getting a mini canister thats air driven. pretty much you remove 10-20% of your tank with a sheet of glass, 2 holes one in the bot corner and one in the opposite conner on the top. then you place some baffles in water comes in passes over all the media to the last area where there is a black tube connected to the main air system, this pumps the water back out( as the water is pumped out more water is sucked in) hence a mini air driven sump.

Cons are you lose tank space and they can be quite loud. IMO its the best way to filter using 1 air pump else you go down the K1 route.

I would personally setup 1-2 main sumps or do the side filter method but use a pump 1000-2000 LPh.

Your fish are big and will produce a lot of waste when large, sponge filters may handle it but you will be required to clean them daily. another issue is sometimes the fish play with the sponge filters. I have a hornet who kept ripping the airline out and throwing the sponges around so the water was always filthy and I had to change it daily. Now he has started ripping the otto apart also >_<.

as for a main sump or 2, yes you could get disease but if your QTing your fish and pay close attention to them you should be fine. A UV can also stop most of the spread. being big strong fish but I wouldn't see much risk. The fry tanks I would run sponges.

Hope this helps!

 

[Miguel]

You are right. There are beasts who daily pull the hoses out of the filter sponges. I have one like that, excatly.

As to the other option uou mention, called the sixth glass in Portugal, it works, but takes around 20% of tank space....

 

[Squirtle919]

AH thats what it is called thank you, here we call it air driven filters which is wrong. I have also seen people do this to the back of the tank they cut the back to x height then pretty much build another tank on the back of there tank. I have no idea how to do it but it will save tank space.