I am suspect that I am providing orders of magnitude more filtration capacity that I can actually use and am wasting space in my sump, making it difficult to isolate larger fish, and increasing the frequency of top offs. I would greatly appreciate some input on this to see if I am way off base or if anyone has some more concrete experience.
I recently read that K1 media is conservatively rated at 250g of food (40% protein) per 50L of K1. This is pretty widely accepted across the web and there has been a ton of scientific and industrial research to back this up. Given the protected area of 500m^2/m^3 (they actually have 800 total, but that includes unprotected surfaces which I guess do not harbor significant colony growth), each liter of media should be good for 5g of food per day.
If we then assume that biological filtration capacity is proportional to surface area of a non-toxic surface, pot scrubbers with their 1200m^2/m^3 (370ft^2/ft^3 as quoted on this forum) should offer even better efficiency by volume. Each cubic foot of pot scrubbers should have a capacity of about 340g/day. We must remember that unlike K1, which is self cleaning, pot scrubbers will eventually get compressed, and build up dead colonies and gunk which will reduce the effective surface area over time. An annual or biannual "fluff" in some de-chlorinated water should help relieve this.
I have am also assuming here that many filter materials are made of non-toxic plastic which should offer similar bacteria growth conditions. Obviously, high surface area silver or copper would not be an effective comparison, to present an extreme example. However, I do not know how the ceramic rings would compare, although I suspect any non-toxic surface will present similar numbers. Also, submerged media will be less effective than oxygenated media. K1 is oxygenated.
With this in mind I considered my setup, a 120g display with a 55g sump running at about 150-160g at any given time. Circulation rate is about 900-1000gph. The filtration is a filter sponge (13x4x2.25"), followed by 11L of K1, a 12x12x1" filter floss, and finally dripped through 174 pot scrubbers (about .9 ft^3). I feed on average 2g of food per day. If I assume that the fish also eat 2 g of plant matter, lets round up to 5g just to be safe. However, based on surface area of my sponge filter, K1, and scrubbers I should have enough biological capacity to deal with over 360g of food per day! The calculated capacities based on the best surface area data I could find are 6.3g, 57g, and 300g for the sponge, K1, and pot scrubbers, respectively. The sponge is probably overestimated since it is not oxygenated. Is this possible, even if only to order of magnitude? I would love to be able to reduce my filtration volume and increase the size of my fuge and return sections.
Any thoughts?
I recently read that K1 media is conservatively rated at 250g of food (40% protein) per 50L of K1. This is pretty widely accepted across the web and there has been a ton of scientific and industrial research to back this up. Given the protected area of 500m^2/m^3 (they actually have 800 total, but that includes unprotected surfaces which I guess do not harbor significant colony growth), each liter of media should be good for 5g of food per day.
If we then assume that biological filtration capacity is proportional to surface area of a non-toxic surface, pot scrubbers with their 1200m^2/m^3 (370ft^2/ft^3 as quoted on this forum) should offer even better efficiency by volume. Each cubic foot of pot scrubbers should have a capacity of about 340g/day. We must remember that unlike K1, which is self cleaning, pot scrubbers will eventually get compressed, and build up dead colonies and gunk which will reduce the effective surface area over time. An annual or biannual "fluff" in some de-chlorinated water should help relieve this.
I have am also assuming here that many filter materials are made of non-toxic plastic which should offer similar bacteria growth conditions. Obviously, high surface area silver or copper would not be an effective comparison, to present an extreme example. However, I do not know how the ceramic rings would compare, although I suspect any non-toxic surface will present similar numbers. Also, submerged media will be less effective than oxygenated media. K1 is oxygenated.
With this in mind I considered my setup, a 120g display with a 55g sump running at about 150-160g at any given time. Circulation rate is about 900-1000gph. The filtration is a filter sponge (13x4x2.25"), followed by 11L of K1, a 12x12x1" filter floss, and finally dripped through 174 pot scrubbers (about .9 ft^3). I feed on average 2g of food per day. If I assume that the fish also eat 2 g of plant matter, lets round up to 5g just to be safe. However, based on surface area of my sponge filter, K1, and scrubbers I should have enough biological capacity to deal with over 360g of food per day! The calculated capacities based on the best surface area data I could find are 6.3g, 57g, and 300g for the sponge, K1, and pot scrubbers, respectively. The sponge is probably overestimated since it is not oxygenated. Is this possible, even if only to order of magnitude? I would love to be able to reduce my filtration volume and increase the size of my fuge and return sections.
Any thoughts?
