Is there something called over-filtration?

[David R]

I'm going to disagree with the general consensus here; obviously you can't have "too much filtration" in the sense that it will be detrimental to the health of your fish (until the water flow becomes excessive), but you can have more filtration than you need which is going to cost you more money to run. If your tank is cycled and you aren't getting detectable ammonia then adding more bio filtration will achieve nothing. The amount of beneficial bacteria present is relative to the amount of waste your fish produce not the amount of surface area available (unless there isn't enough).

IME with Panaques and the sawdust they produce, you're never going to completely filter it out, but there are ways to help reduce it. If you have the third canister spare and want to try catch more of the sawdust then you could set it up with nothing but a couple of layers of coarse foam (like 10ppm Poret) and place the intake somewhere near the bottom of the tank [depending on substrate] where it will catch most of the sawdust. You want to keep it fairly empty to keep the flow as high as possible, and clean the foam fairly regularly. Then run the other canisters with the intakes higher up in the water column and run finer mechanical media like filter wool before the bio.

 

[nossalucard]

I'm going to disagree with the general consensus here; obviously you can't have "too much filtration" in the sense that it will be detrimental to the health of your fish (until the water flow becomes excessive), but you can have more filtration than you need which is going to cost you more money to run. If your tank is cycled and you aren't getting detectable ammonia then adding more bio filtration will achieve nothing. The amount of beneficial bacteria present is relative to the amount of waste your fish produce not the amount of surface area available (unless there isn't enough).


THIS........ is 100% DEAD-ON POINT. More bio is NOT going to help if you have more surface area than your REQUIRED amount of BB needed. Like was said, if "clarity" is the issue, however, filter floss goes a long way, but always put floss in an easily accessible filter, so you don't have to constantly break down your canister filter if that what you use. Perfect argument for HOB's right there, and why I use them for mechanical in addition to my "bio can" FX6.

 

[nossalucard]

THIS........ is 100% DEAD-ON POINT. More bio is NOT going to help if you have more surface area than your REQUIRED amount of BB needed. Like was said, if "clarity" is the issue, however, filter floss goes a long way, but always put floss in an easily accessible filter, so you don't have to constantly break down your canister filter if that what you use. Perfect argument for HOB's right there, and why I use them for mechanical in addition to my "bio can" FX6.

 

[David R]

That's good strategy, having the FX6 providing bio (obviously with enough mechanical to prevent the bio media getting gunked up) and using HOBs (or canisters) for additional mechanical/polishing. Turn-over/flow is more important for the mechanical filtration; the more water you can move through the media the more particulate you'll catch, where as even as little as 2-3 times turn over can be plenty for bio filtration.

 

[demonknight]

Ah man, just when i set up the filter with the regular medias

Ah well, the smaller sunsun is due for a cleanup. Shall use that as a mech filter then. That should be a good balance i guess.

I wish i could use hobs but space is an issue. No gaps for them to hang.

 

[tiger15]

Yes, there can be over biological filtration.

In a typical tank with substrate and ornaments, there will be more than adequate biological filtration provided adequate flow is provided. The total surface area of the substrate, tank walls and ornaments provides plenty of living spaces for the BB and additional bio media is not needed. It's wrong to believe that getting more filters with large bio media will get more biological filtration out of saturation point. The only situation where more biological filters are needed is if you run your over crowded monster fish tank in sterile bare bottom, similar to food fish aquaculture environment.

Yes, you can have excessive flow, yet still lacking adequate mechanical filtration.

Most people buy filters based on the flow rate, the bigger the better, and don't realize that you need commensurable flow area for mechanical filtration. Once the flow area is clogged, mechanical filtration is stopped or restrained, and more flow will just bypass the media, or in case of canister filter, flow is reduced to trickling. Media cross sectional area, not media volume, determines the mechanical filtration capacity. Many canister filters have large media volume, but not much flow cross sectional area, is limited in mechanical. Similarly, a very high flow rated filter with small media cross sectional area is a poor mechanical filter as it will just get clogged up quickly requiring frequent media cleaning.

Most HOBs fall into high flow rate, low mechanical (and biological) capacity system. Most canisters have high biological capacity (that you may not need), but low mechanical capacity. Most sump systems have high flow rate, high mechanical, and high biological capacity and should be the ultimate system for big monster fish tanks.