I have two Penguin 350's on my 55g brackish tank and it seems like everytime I replace the filter cartriges I get a nitrite spike. I know most of my bio filtraion is on he bio wheels but am I removing too much at once? Should I replace them one at a time over he course of a few days?
Replacing cartriges on a HOB
- Thread starter FalconKeeper
- Start date
Hmm ok so since there are 4 cartriges total (two per filter) should I do both in one filter and then the other filter later or one individual cartrige at a time?
Looks to me as if for some reason the benefical bacteria is not building up on your biowheels. Do you clean your biowheels at all? You may want to run the filters without cartridges for a while and let the BB get built up on the biowheels. I've run biowheels for many years and never seen this happen.
I have never cleaned the biowheels other than cleaning out the pockets they sit in to make they spin again if I see them stop completely. Other than that I only clean the intake tube/impeller and replace the cartridges about every three weeks.