astablished ugf->add powerhead??help!!!

[Niles6705]

i am removing my undergravel filters, switching to wet/dry (well i was but moving so put it on hold till beginning of june)
but the ugf in the Rope tank has alot of dirt under it (i think) and when i say dirt i literally mean dirt lol i feed live worms and alot of the time a little dirt gets in the tank.. and over time has become alot of dirt..
so my long drawn out question is do u think it would be able to put a powerhead on one of the tubes to clear it out??
i was thinking of putting some filter media in the tube then the powerhead on top.. just trying to aviod vacuming over n over n over and still chancing a filthy tank.. but im worried itll be a disaster and blow crap everywhere
ne thoughts or alternative options? (im sure there are)..thanks!

 

[m1ste2tea]

chances are whatever you try you will end up with some of that dirt in your water.

what kind of substrate do you have covering the undergravel filter plates and how much of it? Im asking this because with my undergravel filter plates I am able to siphon out the sediment below the plates with a small diameter tube which gives me the high suction that is required. The trick is to get the end of the siphon tube to butt up against the UGF plate and trough through the substrate wherever you think you have the sediment collected. I have a 2 inch layer of polished river pebbles over my plates so that its not that hard to push the tube through it.

chances are that half of that "sediment" underneath the plates is actually beneficial bacteria

 

[Niles6705]

bout 2 inch, its not flat panels though is ^^^^^ shaped so its kinda hard to get right on it, (should have mentioned that earlier) i did it your way on my other tank and it worked pretty good, i got half out and have half to go, but the ^^^^ one doesnt seem to really get much out

thats the tank, bout 2 inches of sub, cant wait for new stands!! that one was my first diy stand, so ugly lol

 

[KAWAMIKIE]

Rinse off the worms before throwing them in your tank.

A UGF is not a set and forget it. You must clean the gravel to keep it from plugging up. With weekly water changes I lightly vac my gravel in my 35 with UGF.

If your UGF has multiple holes for stand pipes, siphon from one and connect your fill hose to the opposite one. It may flush it out. Use a gravel vac first to get out most of the crap.

 

[Niles6705]

i vac it once a week, im just overly concerned because i have limited time because were movin next week so i dont wanna cause to much stress, i tried the power head idea today and it went ok, wasnt nearly as bad as what i though, i was seeing dirt when i would more my air stones so i thongt it was alot worse than it really is i ran it on suction for bout an hour the removed the media and ran it in reverse and nothing nasty came out, gone one side removed gonna wait till wed to do the other half