Ira

I tested the 404 yesterday to see how much it was flowing. It was pumping about 780 Liters/hour(Advertised as should be 1300). Should turning over the tank almost 8 times an hour be enough?

How would it being an overflow system make it flow more?

Also, a lot of plants grow fine without having any soil at all, with their roots just floating in the water. If you've got a lot of nutrients in your water for the plants, and the substrate isn't very rich, say just plain fine gravel, then the flow of water past the roots could conceivably improve the growth of the plants.

Just swapped the connectors around so the newer one, the one with the lever to stop the water flow, is on my 200 liter tank. I tested it, it's now flowing about 540 liters per hour. So, about a 2/3 increase in flow just from that. And I did check, the other connection was clean, no blockages. Not sure how much the flow difference would be out of the spray bar, probably less than a 2/3 increase. I think Warren or Pegasus was saying they pulled the guts out of the older type and got a big increase in flow, probably would be similar to the newer one. That paragraph would be so much easier to keep track of if I knew the right names for the connections or some better name than old and new.

But, the weight of the water going up from the filter on the outlet side is forced upwards by the weight of the water going down on the inlet side. Want proof? Get your gravel vacuum. Stick one end into the tank, suck on the other end. Once the water is flowing plug it with your finger and hold the other end above the water level of the tank with the rest drooping. The water level in the end of the hose will settle at exactly the same level as the level in the water of the tank. It's EXACTLY the same with a cannister filter except there's a box in the system. The box doesn't change anything. If it works the way you believe, then the water would pour down to the lowest point in the hose and stop. Obviously it doesn't do that, it continues the rest of the way up. It's extremely simple. Ever hear of the phrase, "Water finds its own level?"

Just to be thorough, the filter(both fluval 404s) I previously mentioned was cleaned 1 week ago. Inside it 1 tray of big ceramic noodles, 1 tray of small ceramic noodles, 1 tray of small pebbly media and one empty tray. Along with, of course, the 4 sponges. It's a newer head, about 6 months old. Using smooth rubber tubes and the older type of connection to the filter, the one without the second lever to shut off the water flow. The second filter is an older head, 2+years old, using the newer ribbed plastic tubes and the newer connection to the cannister. First filter, 6.4L in 60 seconds=384 liters/hour Ok, the other filter. Contains 1 tray of big noodles, one tray of small noodles, one tray of carbon and one empty tray. Before cleaning: 9.25 L in 45 seconds=740 liters/hour <-- After cleaning, empty:9.2L in 45 seconds=736 Liters/Hour After cleaning, full: 8.9L in 45 seconds=712 Liters/Hour Each time was after letting the filter run for 5-10 minutes to make sure most air is out. Well, after all that work, I guess I'd have to say that the error in my measurements is probably greater than the difference in flow rate between empty and loaded, in this case. How...Unenlightening. I'm NOT happy to find out that my cichlid tank's filter is pumping about half what the I've got on the guppy's tank is. Probably would be better to do each test 3 times. Might retest the cichlid tank in a bit, I'm watching Andromeda though.

The only height that matters for the pump is how high the outlet is above the surface of the water. The distance to go from the inlet down to the cannister and back up to the level of the water doesn't matter except for the resistance of the hoses. Basically it's like siphoning the water down and through the cannister and back up. So the pump only has to lift the water an extra inch or two, less if the outlet is at the surface of the water or below. Gimme a few minutes I'll be finished testing the output of the other filter and will post the results.

Just tested mine. Got 384 liters per hour. That was by holding the outlet about the same height it is when running normally and pouring into a bucket for 1 minute then scooping the water out with a 1 L measuring cup. The filter in this case only has to pump the water a height of less than 2 inches. Hmmm...One of my other 404s could probably use a clean, I might go and try testing it before cleaning, empty and with the media but after cleaning.

So, we all have a bunch of in vitro fish?

I was going to suggest going to http://www.ak.planet.gen.nz/~bio/ But I checked and they don't seem to have grindal worms. They do have microworms, that might be a possible alternative?

Probably the biggest restriction would be the sponges and any filter wool, especially as they get clogged. The ceramic media I don't think is much of a restriction even when it's full of muck, there's still heaps of open spaces for water to flow through. Midas, I might suggest trying what Caryl's done, only one tray full of filter wool and the rest with media. I don't actually have any filter wool in mine, just media and the sponges. How have you been measuring the flow? Just pull off the outlet hose and point it into a bucket for a minute then measure how much came out? Hmmm, I might try that, grab a measuring cup to measure the water volume...

I just thought of something, the cafe at the place I work has a big...I don't know quite how to describe it...tray kind of thing that must have a freezer unit under it built into the count They use it to put fruit and meat in dishes to sell during lunch. It's a similar size, maybe a bit bigger, to my 200 liter tank. If you could get one of those that was being tossed out or could buy one it should have more than enough grunt to keep the tank cold if you put the tank on it. At the very least it builds up ice in places that aren't covered. I wouldn't have a clue where to look for something like that though.

If you have any bags or charcoal or anything like that, try taking them out. I had 4 bags in my fluval and took them out because the bags were disintegrating, AMAZING difference. Before it was pumping enough out of the spraybar to make a bit of a current and trickling sound. Now it's pumping out enough that when the fish swim under the spray bar they have to start swimming upwards to stay off the bottom, are swimming in a blizzard of bubbles and it's making hissing/wooshing sound. Probably pumping twice the water just from removing the bags.

Did you consider letting it warm up to room temperature? I don't know if the animals in there could handle it or not, but I'd be inclined to think most could. However...Probably would have been good to try testing it on a smaller scale than the whole tank. Don't want to lose all that work collecting them if they couldn't handle the heat. Yes, I know, bad fishkeeping and all that, but still, most animals are pretty adaptable and...Well, I'm too lazy to swap 15 bottles of ice a day.

How hard is it to keep a tank warm? Throw in 1-2 $50 if you're cheap heaters, adjust them to the right temp. Done. (In case you misunderstood because of that typo, I meant keeping them cold would be harder.) I tried catching some freshwater cockabullies and keeping them in a small tank once. I caught about 8-9 little fry, couldn't catch any adults. Was fun chasing after them with the nets I use for my tanks, but the adults were too fast and my wife thought I was an idiot. Unfortunately they were all dead within 2 days. I think next time I'll try putting in a heater with the temp as low as it will go and a small filter and not trying dropping a tiny bit of a couple different types of food in the tank to see if there was anything that they'd eat.

Keeping them could would be a LOT harder than keeping a tropical marine setup warm. Which doesn't make things easy. Sounds like fun though, Caryl. Actually, I've been putting way too much time into thinking about how to keep a tank cool, for some reason. One interesting but expensive way I've come up with is bunch of peltiers cooling a piece of aluminum that the water zig zags back and forth through with the peltiers pumping the heat into a really big heatsink with fans on it. Would be expensive though. Searching through the forum, Warren said he could get 50 watt peltiers for about $35 each. I think to keep a tank at 10C in the middle of the summer it'd take at least 300-450 watts of heat removal and probably need about 600 watts worth of peltiers. So that comes out to $420 just for the peltiers, add maybe $300 more for heatsink, fans, getting the aluminum block made up...Expensive. But you could always flip the polarity around and use it as a heater. Or use a watercooled heatsink and put the heat into keeping another tank warm...I need to quit thinking so much at work.

Hehe, Yeah, I actually I do have indian fern in the tank. Can't think of anything recently that I've put in the tank that could have brought them with it. It's been months since I've fished any mosquito larvae out of the pond, there aren't any at the moment. I suppose they could have come in then and been in really small numbers until I put some floating plants in. I DID buy some plants at the last UHAS meeting 3 weeks ago, maybe they came with them?

Thanks everyone. I've got mine sitting on top of the fridge, so that should hopefully be a little cooler. I better put something over it though, it's in a clear plastic container.

Little round dots is about the best description I can give you, pegasus.

Just had a look at the culture again after punching a bunch of holes in the lid. It's full of little red bugs. I'm guessing that's a very bad sign.

Not worried about them escaping, worried about it drying out too much. I'll check it daily and just give it a quick spray with a spray bottle if it's a bit dry. I'm definitely not in any hurry, I'm doing this more out of curiousity than need for food. Maybe next I'll try some earthworms to feed my cichlids, hehehehe.

Since the glass is supposed to be a fairly tight fit I'm assuming that the container should be relatively sealed? I mean not air tight but it shouldn't be open topped? I'll give the culture a little while and see what happens, then I'll see if I can find something like a piece of glass to lay on the top. For the moment would a lid with a bunch of holes poked in it be good or what? Oh, and for food, I've just dusted the top of the dirt with baby cereal after dumping the whole container of the culture on top and spreading it around. I did it before you said not to spread it.

Not that I've noticed. I doubt the fish even notice them. Most of the fish in there are 4"+ and the bugs are somewhere around .0000000000001 inches.

Do you actually read the links you suggest? It says, "we recommend that you consider using a plastic shoebox or a plastic sweater box for culturing." Anyway, seeing as I have a plastic container and don't have a wooden one, I'm going to try the plastic one.

I only bought the whiteworm culture about Ummm...5 hours ago. And it's been sitting in a different room the whole time. Is it something I should be worried about?