sump bio media, how do they filter properly

[henward]

ok, might sound strange but i am used to canisters.

in a canister, the bio media gets 100% exposure from the water flow every single time the water turns over.

but in a sump, you cannot 100% evenly distribute the trickle of the water fromt he top of the tower - usually thefilter wool down to the bio media.

i have made my trickle uniform as possible, but how does this work? i have seen sumps where the bio media isnt entirely splashed all the time.

[alanmin4304]

There are different flow rates through various portions of the media in a cannister filter as well.

[henward]

fair enough

but in theory, having that wet dry sump set up gives better filtration though right?

[davidb]

the best bacteria are aerobic, so having the the media wet, but not underwater, will be the best for filtration. You can also stick a hose from an airpump in there if you want to increase oxygen levels. In all my systems I maintain, I run filter wool, media, then filter media. These are all in trays with holes in the bottom, so that the top layer of filter wool get rid of the big pieces of crap, and because it is above the media, the evenly spaced holes in the top tray means that the bio-media is all equally dampened, but is never submerged. By the way, how is the puffer I sold you going?

[Ianab]

The thing is you dont need 100% efficiency.

If some parts of the filter are only running at 50% because of low water flow, so what?

It will still be filtering, and 50L of media in a sump working at 50% is still better than 10L working at 100%

Of course the better the flow and more even it is, the better the filter works, but if the bacteria in the filter have some water flow they will do some good

Ian

[Ira]

And you only get as much cycling bacteria as you have food to feed it. Once you have enough surface area for your bioload increasing efficiency or available surface area is just wasting time and money by giving the bacteria more elbow room. (Flagella room?)