I have 2 cascade 300's and am currently have to change 4 cartridges a week. I will be upgrading to the Fx5 in the future, but until then they are getting to be very expensive because i use so many. I had a thought of pressure washing the old cartridges them boiling them in an old pot we don't use to kill any harmful bacteria and re using them. Any harm in this?
Re using filter cartridges
- Thread starter Alan Russell
- Start date
i reuse filter bads i either hose them good or throw them in the washer with my filter socks and a lil bleach works well.... give it a try....
I don't get it, what are yo udoing that you need to change the pads once a week? I never seen such wastes accumulate before and I know I overfeed my smaller tank and even then it would have taken 3-4 weeks to require a massive cleaning. What you should do is change them in seperate intervals. Change one filter one week and another the week. Otherwise you won't have time for any bacteria to grow.
If the pad is covered with gunk where I can't even tell what color the pad was I won't bother to use it again, if it's just a light covering of gunk I'll just rinse it and re-use. That's what I do with the Whisper cartridges. No sure if Cascade has removable pads like theirs. There's no need to boil it or add chemicals to it hat might be harmful later.
If the pad is covered with gunk where I can't even tell what color the pad was I won't bother to use it again, if it's just a light covering of gunk I'll just rinse it and re-use. That's what I do with the Whisper cartridges. No sure if Cascade has removable pads like theirs. There's no need to boil it or add chemicals to it hat might be harmful later.
To put it simply. i have an over stocked and under filtered tank. It's a 120g with 2 large ocars 2 14 inch pacu a 14 inch peco and a 4" catfish. The fish came with the tank and so did the filtration. So it's not my doing. I bought it just like it is b/c it was to good of a deal to pass up. i found homes for the pacu and they will go this weekend. that will solve my biggest problem. Then i will just need to get better filtration.
The filters have bio media cartrides (i think that's what they are called) that I don't change. the filter cartridges are disposable anyway.
it only takes about 3 days for them to get a thick layer of dark brown "gunk" where i can't tell what color the filter was.
I discussed this in another thread, but it is impossable to keep the water clean. dispite bi-weekly filter changes and bi-weekly 50-75% water changes the water is always "muddy" looking and it only takes a few days before the water is dark brown.
I like the washer idea. i'll try that.