24g aquapod question.

[nick76]

I seem to be getting alot of protien waste build up on my surface of the water. I have the sponge filter still going but it dosnt seem to be drawing in any of the waste on the surface. I do have a Fission Nano Protien Skimmer however I dont think it can be used for surface skim.
Any Ideas?

 

[nick76]

anybody?

 

[peef]

If you block off some of the intakes that are down low in the water and leave only the top intake open it will skim the top of the water keep it clean. It won't affect anything negatively either except you are not taking water from low in the take which is not a big deal.

 

[joncat24]

Originally Posted by peef
If you block off some of the intakes that are down low in the water and leave only the top intake open it will skim the top of the water keep it clean. It won't affect anything negatively either except you are not taking water from low in the take which is not a big deal.
exactly what he said....I had the same problem withmy pod. I cut a piece of black acrylic and put it in front of the bottom grates and in about 5 minutes the surface film was gone.

 

[nick76]

Originally Posted by joncat24
exactly what he said....I had the same problem withmy pod. I cut a piece of black acrylic and put it in front of the bottom grates and in about 5 minutes the surface film was gone.
Ok but do u still stack both those big sponges in after u put the blockade in?

 

[peef]

Honestly I would remove the sponges altogether, they build up waste and then that turns to nitrates. Put some live rock rubble back there!

 

[rldavisou]

Are you getting much skimmate from your fission nano? I bought one, and, personally I found the box it came in more useful than the skimmer.

 

[oceansidefish]

I use the rio nano skimmer and it works awesome!!!!

 

[nick76]

Originally Posted by peef
Honestly I would remove the sponges altogether, they build up waste and then that turns to nitrates. Put some live rock rubble back there!
So what are u using for filter media then? nothing?
I clean out the sponges bi-weekly so theres no nitrate build up, but I dont want to run no kind of filtration. I do have a bunch of rubble in the back already. I suspose I could remove the sponges and run the skimmer instead.

 

[peef]

Thats just MO, yah know. I prefer to only run some filter floss about 1 week a month with carbon and leave only LR rubble in the back. But like I said its just my opinion and not necessarily correct.

 

[nick76]

Originally Posted by peef
Thats just MO, yah know. I prefer to only run some filter floss about 1 week a month with carbon and leave only LR rubble in the back. But like I said its just my opinion and not necessarily correct.
Ill do some experimeting and let ya know what happens. thanks

 

[capschamp]

Originally Posted by Nick76
So what are u using for filter media then? nothing?
I clean out the sponges bi-weekly so theres no nitrate build up, but I dont want to run no kind of filtration. I do have a bunch of rubble in the back already. I suspose I could remove the sponges and run the skimmer instead.
I took everything out and put a small mesh bag with some carbon back there that I replace every two weeks.

 

[er..md]

I have 2 4 G aquapods and put the fission n eh...initially I wasn't impressed an ealpain in te rear to clean them, plus they filled the tank up with microbubbles...So I did this...
First I had to add a piece of plastic to the intake (the supplied pieces don't go high enough...which results in too little drop off to adequately skim the surface....I then cut the sponge so it is only 1 inch thick instead of the 6 or so...I place it so the water falls through it but the whole spnge is above the surface in the filtration chamber...this way the big pieces of garbage collect but don't stay submerged...I rinse it daily....I then put the fission in the timer that controls my blue leds so it only comes on at night ...ie I don't care about the bubbles...it also has a little port in the cup to which I added a piece of tubing which stays on....to clean it I just put a syringe on the tube and suck out the skimmed garbage (the black cap that was on the port fits on the tube to keep it from draining back into the tank)
seems to be working well