# canister filter media and placement



## jeff5347 (Aug 15, 2011)

Hey all i have a few questions. I have 2 filters running on my 75 gallon tanks that house a kribensis, 2 festivums, 2 german blue rams and 3 dwarf cichlids which i think are bolivian rams.
I'm running a sunsun 4 stage canister filter and an old penguin 350 hob. The hob i have setup to skim the surface of the water for any film and floating junk. House in there are baskets on each side in which i have aquarium gravel for bacteria to grow on. in front i have filter floss or polyfil to clean the water and carbon in front of the filter floss.

On the canister the flow goes from bottom to top so i have 1. polyfill in the bottom tray, 2. again polyfil in the second tray, 3. bioballs in the 3rd tray and 4. more polyfil in the last tray.

Im assuming my media in the canister needs to be reorganized and was wondering from bottom to top..dirty water to clean water if this is how i should proceed to see better cleaning:

Bottom tray-pot scrubbers, porous car was sponge such as this Auto Drive Wash Sponge: Auto Detailing & Car Care : Walmart.com (these usually dont have chemicals in them) for large debris, feces, ect
next tray- bioballs, seachem matrix, broken lava rock, ect for bacteria
second to last tray- polyfil for polishing
lat tray- polyfil with purigen (dont have purigen but will be getting some) for polishing and clarity

Just curious on your thoughts on media, placement, amount and how you would place media and what you would add, take out, add more of, ect. 
I've read and watched so many different ways to organize the media my heads about to explode lol.

This is my first canister so just want to make sure its set up correctly.
Thanks


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## Aquaman55g (Oct 5, 2010)

I personally adhere to the pondguru channel method of water filtering, which is that in a canister filter that flows from the bottom to the top the bottom tray should have a coarse sponge at the very bottom then a medium sponge or a pink or blue double sided foam / floss then topped with floss to capture small debris. The theory is that all of your mechanical filtration should take place before the water even touches your biological and chemical media.
I will also add that I personally use and endorse both BioHome biological media and Marine pure biological media for huge surface area for great bacteria growth. Best of luck. :betta:


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## AJerman (Aug 12, 2014)

Well, I don't know if there's necessarily a right or wrong way to do it. As long as your water is clear and healthy, that's really all that matters I suppose, but yeah, I'd agree with mechanical first, then bio at the top in "clean" water.

I'm running (or will be when the Seachem Matrix gets here) the bottom basket with quilt batting as my main mechanical, then pot scrubbers in the middle, then Seachem Matrix at the top, though maybe I should change that to pot scrubbers on the bottom since they are more coarse than the quilt batting. I guess that depends on if I'm considering them more mechanical or bio and how quickly the quilt batting gets clogged and slows flow. My thought was that it was really simple to pull the bottom layer of batting (I've got 4 or 5 thin layers) out and toss it if it gets gunked up and move to the next, putting a new layer on top.

I'm all for hearing others opinions on the matter as well though.


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## jeff5347 (Aug 15, 2011)

On the sunsun 304b the flow goes bottom to top. I had bought some coarse filter from Petco that goes in a hob and it came w 4 pieces roughly 2x2x6. All 4 fit in the bottom tray perfectly w no gaps. I then put in the next tray my filter floss which made about 2 inches thick. Next tray has bio balls fit together like legos with pot scrubbers and the last tray has more pot scrubbers w filter floss on top and a 100ml packet of purigen. Seems to be working nice. I really hadn't cleaned the canister since it started working back in June. I took out the impeller to clean the junk and sludge and wow was it caked in. Also cleaned the hoses as they were filled with tons of slop. The setup seems to have cleaned the water nicely but time will tell. I also have a hob and as of late I have a bamboo and about 4 stalks of pothos plant in there to help suck up excess nutrients. There is a 26w cfl 6500k bulb above there to help them grow. 
I'd like to hear other ideas though on how to improve filtration whether by canister, hob or insterted plants in the hob. 

My next project ..wife willing.. Is riparium..mmm they look awesome!!!


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