Water Clarity

[Gruntking]

You need to clean the XP3 at least once every 2 weeks it clogs up very fast. And cleaning the filter will not kill BB as long as you place the bio media in a bucket with tank water.

You should run your XP3 like this...

Bottom tray: 2 sponges (20/30), then bio media on top of that
Middle tray: All bio media
Top tray: 3/4 bio media then microfiltration pad

 

[creepyoldguy]

Whenever you notice flow rate is down. That may be some of yor prob. When I ran two canisters on a tank, I liked having one full of bio media and the other for eater polishing. I never touched the one full of bio media. You can go months and months without touching it allowing for your media to grow. Regardless how ou set it up, just rinse the pads out in tankwater and keep the bio media submerged as much as Possible

 

[JC09]

as of now i have the sponges (20/30) and biomedia middle tray, but also the carbon on the top tray which will soon be replaced by more bioo media

 

[creepyoldguy]

I personally set my xp3/4s full of nothing but bio media because their flowrate sucks. You can set yours up to your choice, bottom line, you need more bio

 

[creepyoldguy]

And there is no set schedule when to clean your canisters. That depends on many things like feeding, stock, water changes, types of media being used etc etc