Cleaning Biomedia

[spas]

Hey guys,

My 265 leaked back in March this year. I shut the tank down and didn't bother to clean my 2 2262's until today. I was a little turned off after the leak.

I'm looking at getting a replacement 300 gallon from custom aquariums so I decided to clean out the filters today. Oh man, when I popped the lids off it stank worse than a bucket of dirty diapers.

When I pulled the bio media bags out, I washed them thoroughly but noticed the siporax had turned black. I have approx 3 litres of siporax, 5 litres of seachem pond matrix and about 2 litres of the eheim bio balls.

Should i let the bio media soak in a 50/50 bleach/water and then rinse thoroughly or is just rinsing good enough?

Secondly, I noticed my eheim bag that holds the biomedia is getting a little old. What do you guys use as replacement bio bags?

Thanks,
Steve

 

[tlindsey]

Hey guys,

My 265 leaked back in March this year. I shut the tank down and didn't bother to clean my 2 2262's until today. I was a little turned off after the leak.

I'm looking at getting a replacement 300 gallon from custom aquariums so I decided to clean out the filters today. Oh man, when I popped the lids off it stank worse than a bucket of dirty diapers.

When I pulled the bio media bags out, I washed them thoroughly but noticed the siporax had turned black. I have approx 3 litres of siporax, 5 litres of seachem pond matrix and about 2 litres of the eheim bio balls.

Should i let the bio media soak in a 50/50 bleach/water and then rinse thoroughly or is just rinsing good enough?

Secondly, I noticed my eheim bag that holds the biomedia is getting a little old. What do you guys use as replacement bio bags?

Thanks,
Steve

Personally I would just replace with new bio media.

 

[NVTE]

Turn black mean dead bateria. You can soak them with bleach and rinse them well and let it dry for day or 2 . I think they are fine to use.

 

[skjl47]

Should i let the bio media soak in a 50/50 bleach/water and then rinse thoroughly or is just rinsing good enough?

I used bleach to sanitize tank. I discovered after setting up the first tank that a rinse alone is not enough. I dosed the tank with PRIME and all was fine.
I had soaked the gravel substrate in the bleach solution and suspect the spaces in between the gravel was still holding the bleach solution.
Anyway the Prime did the trick. I suspect other brands of water conditioner will do as well, I have only used PRIME however.

 

[Jhay3513]

Hey guys,

My 265 leaked back in March this year. I shut the tank down and didn't bother to clean my 2 2262's until today. I was a little turned off after the leak.

I'm looking at getting a replacement 300 gallon from custom aquariums so I decided to clean out the filters today. Oh man, when I popped the lids off it stank worse than a bucket of dirty diapers.

When I pulled the bio media bags out, I washed them thoroughly but noticed the siporax had turned black. I have approx 3 litres of siporax, 5 litres of seachem pond matrix and about 2 litres of the eheim bio balls.

Should i let the bio media soak in a 50/50 bleach/water and then rinse thoroughly or is just rinsing good enough?

Secondly, I noticed my eheim bag that holds the biomedia is getting a little old. What do you guys use as replacement bio bags?

Thanks,
Steve

My bio media bags from Walmart. $0.94 each

 

[deeda]

Another option is the lingerie mesh bags as they are offered in various sizes and the mesh holes are a bit smaller. I use them for my 2260/2262 filters.

 

[spas]

Many Thanks for the reply's guys!!!

I will try soaking the biomedia in bleach water and rising and then soaking in fresh water with Prime.

My new tank will not arrive until Dec so I have lots of time....

Thanks for the tips on the laundry bags!!! Off to Walmart this week

 

[Jhay3513]

Many Thanks for the reply's guys!!!

I will try soaking the biomedia in bleach water and rising and then soaking in fresh water with Prime.

My new tank will not arrive until Dec so I have lots of time....

Thanks for the tips on the laundry bags!!! Off to Walmart this week

For a canister you'll need no more than 2 of those bags. I made my media bags huge for my sump and made 3 from one laundry bag. I closed them off with zip ties. As my fish (Nandopsis Haitiensis) grow I plan to just keep adding media until the sump is filled with bio. I have matrix, ceramic rings, and lava rock in there currently