White flakes coming from return

[twentyleagues]

It's just sloughed bio film from the hoses, nothing to be concerned about. It will breakdown/ disappear....

+1

 

[Fish Tank Travis]

What do you have your water returning to your tank running through? ie ribbed hose, clear vinyl, pvc? I've seen this on ribbed hoses usually and only ribbed its a build up of bacteria. Its dead and it falls off hose wall when power is cut then when pump is turned back on it gets pushed into tank. I started having same issue with my hoses on my fluval canister filters. I didn't know what was going on, lfs said to use clear vinyl and it stopped happening. The bacteria colonizes the inside of the ribs and builds up and then dies. No ribs nowhere to colonize.

That's strange because the return lines are 1" clear vinyl and the drain lines are 1.5" clear vinyl.

 

[Fish Tank Travis]

Thanks for all of the replies.

A little more info:

The hoses are 1" clear vinyl and other than water change time they are full and running about 800gph each (there are two returns).

I do have extremely hard water. My ph sits around 8.4-8.6. However, I run a water softener with sodium chloride salt (not the potassium stuff), which is supposed to pull all of the hard minerals out.

I age my water in barrels for at least 24 hours prior to using it in a water change.

Any other advice would be great. The return lines are behind the tank and really aren't accessible to take off for cleaning. If I have to, I will probably just deal with it and pull the mechanical sponge out for an extra rinse a day later.

 

[jokidd]

I’m having the same problem just little white lines. They are really tiny. If you’re far enough away, you can’t even see them get up close and it is cloudy get even closer you can actually see them individually. I only have a 15 gallon tank I use a under gravel filter and all of it about Brand New tank rocks and filters heater. The only one thing that has been used is a plastic plant. The only tubing I use is no in for an air pump. It is one other thing that all my water goes there is milk cartons I repurpose two or hold my water for water changes. Could it possibly be tiny flakes of plastic?

 

[jokidd]

I did not see anyone that had my same problem, except for maybe the milk cartons holding the water