Can you use regular landscape lava rock for submerged bio material? Bio balls are meant for wet/dry application, i.e. out of the water, just having water dripped over them right? And stuff like the Seachem Matrix rocks and Fluval bio media are meant for canister filters, which are completely submerged, so I would guess that could work also, but that is pretty pricey stuff. I was hoping to hit up the local landscape place and pick up some cheap lava rock to use in my sump. Is that safe? Would it work well also? Thanks.
Sump bio media question...
- Thread starter ChiPerf
- Start date
I got a gallon of matrix off amazon.com for only $30 and it will supposedly treat 400 gallons of water. you could use lava rock but what i have read and seen people say it is a somewhat poor bio media
There's nothing wrong with it at all, it's just not gonna have the surface area of some of the other, better biomedias. Lava rock works fine though, it trust takes more of it to support the same load as a smaller portion of Matrix for example.
I have one of my canisters on my mbunas tank loaded up with limestone lol. Buffers and supports some bio
I have one of my canisters on my mbunas tank loaded up with limestone lol. Buffers and supports some bio
The area I have to fill is pretty large. If I did it with Matrix it would cost $300 or something crazy, so I'm just looking for anything to help with keeping the BB in the sump. I'm sure Matrix would be best, but too expensive right now, and I think this sump is already overkill for what is going to be in there. I also have 10 gallons of bio balls and some other media to go in there, so I'm guessing I'll be fine no matter what. As long as it's safe, I'll use it.
Who knows what this stuff is? It looks plastic possibly? I would guess I could use this as submersible bio media too?
The surface area of lava rock is not as good as some cintered glass medias but it's more than sufficient for most applications. The problem with it is the particles that break off "the dust" is basically very small abrassive rocks that can wreak havoc on a pump if not set up properly.
I have a ton of it in this sump right now, so hopefully it will work fairly well. There is still a ton of dust too, even though I rinsed all of it very well. It should get caught in the mechanical filter pad or maybe just settle on the bottom and mix with the substrate. Is the bag above filled with bio media? Can I just dump it in the sump too?
Make sure you use some kind of pad post the lava rock and pre pump to be safe, if your worried. There is no telling what's in the bag so to speak but just about anything can become biomedia so your probably good. Just make sure it's not crushed coral or anything that will have an impact on your pH. You can always float it in a bucket a few days and compare before and after test results if you think you need to.
I know it's not coral or anything like that. They are very small uniform plastic pieces exactly alike. I'll throw them in. 
Thanks.
Thanks.