Bio wheels are bunk? (some observations)

  • We are currently upgrading MFK. thanks! -neo
L

lipadj46

Feeder Fish
MFK Member
Mar 11, 2011
936
0
0
queensbury
I recently went from 2 HOB filters to 1 canister. The 1st HOB was a whisper 60 with 4 bags of bio max in it (no cartridges) 2nd was an emperor 400 with bio max in the baskets. I put a sunsun HW404B on there and put the bio max from the whisper 60 in it snd removed the wishper HOB and kept the Emperor and canister running for 1 week. During that time there was no ammonia or nitrite spike. I then removed the emperor (with 2 bio wheels and 2 bags of bio max) expecting to see at least a small bump in ammonia but I did not see any spike in either ammonia or nitrites.

I would think that if the bio wheels were doing any biofiltration that there would have been a small mini cycle as the bacteria grew in the canister. To me this shows that the bio wheels do not compare to a good cermamic type bio bedia.
 
Biowheels work but I would rather use other forms of biological filtration (biomax, seachem matrix, etc).
 
The reason you didn't see any jump in ammonia is because you put the biomax from our whisper in the canister. This media is what already had supported your tank. During the week your canister was running along with the bio wheels, the other media in the canister was growing beneficial bacteria.

Bacteria will grow to support the load on your tank, given there is enough surface area for this bacteria to grow. Chances are in your case, you actually had more bio media than what was needed, so when you took the biowheels off, the media in the canister was enough to compensate for the loss
 
Bio wheels add oxygen....The filters move a decent amount of water. I prefer cannisters anyday though!!
 
I have 4 emperor filters, if I am going to use a HOB I try to get an emperor because I already have so many.

Anyway, when I want to setup a new tank I steal one of the 4 biowheels from my display tank and throw it on the new filter. I have added fish the same day with no ammonia spike so I know that the bacteria are on the wheels and are doing their job for my tank.

My only biomedia is the biowheels (4 of them in two emperor 400's) on my 75 gallon tank.

I have 2 slots in each side of each of my emperors, in the rear slot I run scotchbrite pads on in the media baskets I stuff poly fill quilt batting as a micro scrubber. I clean the crap out of the poly fil and scotchbrite pads EVERY week, no issues so far..
 
You forget all the bacteria that was all over the tank`s interior, as well as any in the media you transferred to the canister.
Kind of "bunk" to label your tanks reaction as common to all bio wheel systems.
$0.02
 
How does that prove that bio-wheels don't work if you put old media in the canister?????
 
Joe M;5019210; said:
How does that prove that bio-wheels don't work if you put old media in the canister?????
Click to expand...

Easy, there is only so much bacteria needed to support the tank. One would assume there was some in the bio media that was put in the canister and some was in the emperor bio wheel. When the emperor was removed (with all its media and wheels) all that bacteria was removed. That left just the bacteria in the canister which is not enough (in theory) to support the entire bioload so you would expect at least a small uptick in ammonia while the bacteria colony grew in the canister.
 
I see where you're coming from op. In theory you are prob 100% correct. There is a timeline in when the ammonia is present and ten broken down to eventually nitrates. The spike more or likely been minimal, and the API test couldn't pick it up. The API tests are good but they're no lab equipment
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
MonsterFishKeepers.com
Top Bottom