Bio ball trickle tower filter VS fluidized bed filter

  • We are currently upgrading MFK. thanks! -neo
Personally all filters have their pros and cons you need to consider what is the end result in effeciency, ease of maintenance, cannot tell you how many hob byists fail because the thing is too Damn hard to service, see this alot on the marine side, and cost and room, quietness are all factors as well as service parts and costs to run, In this hobby cheap is NOT always the best routes with electrical equipment especially. What fish are you interested in then we can advise better. Wise to take your time and make sure all the questions are answered, Trust me from thirty yrs experience. Good Luck.
 
I have used both, (and both at the same time) in a bank of tanks that equal about 300 gallons and they are both work well.
I built my of FB to work for a large capacity, it is 4 ft high, 12" in diameter and holds bout 2 lbs of aragonite sand, which helps to buffer alkalinity and pH.
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At first it was under pressure, but found it was easier to maintain, and worked the same with the top off.
 
Both trickle and fluidized bed do the same thing, biological filtration. With the trickle, you can ad mechanical a bit easier. You could put a filter sock on the outflow of the FB to accomplish mechanical filtration but it maybe not be done as easily. During a power outage FB filters can become jammed with media and a properly sized FB may be very cumbersome to work with. That is why I took the top off and altered mine, for ease of maintenance. At 4 ft in height and 10" in diameter, it weighed in at around 50lbs.
 
the thing with the sand filter is that the sand slowly 'sands' away the material used to contain it. also the sand itself is breaking down but i imagine you have years of use before that's even a problem.
 
I built a giant sand filter tower and it worked extremely well until my check valve failed and I sucked sand back up the pipe. I dis have a problem starting it back up once it got established with bio and set for a while during water changes I would have to shake the tower until it got rolling again. When it failed I got a 32 gallon plastic garbage can and fulled it Willard half lava rock half pot scrubbies.... it also workes very well but there is alot less worth about anything failing
 
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