Hey guys currently running AQUA ONE CF-2400, top tray is carbon, im hearing all sorts of stories about carbon, not to sure what to believe, if most are true, what to recommend to replace it with, cheers in advance
As far as carbon goes in my tank, ive never seen water so clear in my life, its amazing !
Im assuming most people here are using large tanks, what are you guys using??


Here are some examples from ive read...

carbon last only 2 weeks
carbon last 6 months
carbon takes out to much of the "good stuff"
carbon cost to much
or its completely useless...

blah blah blah..

The truth.
carbon can't last 6 months it last 2-4 wks more like 2 with the sort of mess oscars make. it can last if you had very little fish in large tank( neons).

it dose remove a lot of good nutriments that plants need.

there isn't much need for it with oscars. FACT. you change to much water for the carbon to be much use. carbon needs to absorb the "bad" its not instant. by this time you are doing a water change again. Or should be.

cost dose not matter to me, if I needed it i would buy it or not keep fish. i don't need it so don't buy it.

its not useless. it removes meds/smell and bad colour from water. some sensitive fish in community tanks would need it. if you had a large mixed tank that wasn't overstocked I would say buy carbon. it keeps water looking clearer for longer.

Its thought the small dust that comes with carbon can irritate gills and cause HITH(stress) but this is NOT confirmed.

I would remove for media, bio balls or sponge. i perfer balls/tubes. save the carbon for a day you may need it.

i agree with marcus on his carification of the use of carbon in filters. it is not a necessary addition and can, if not properly maintained, cause problems in the tank. i personally do not use carbon but i do keep some on hand in case i have to remove meds from the tank.

lol if i ran my tank without changing the filters for 6 months... wow that would be a mess and a bunch of dead fish lol.

that stuff has a limit, and once that limit is reached you need to replace it, and infact, if my theory is correct, if you hit that cappacity, and then change the water, without replacing some of the carbon (like my HOB, i do weekly water changes, and every 2 weeks i change ONE of the two carbon filters in it, and the next 2 weeks i replace the other, so there is still the biofiltration factor from the beneficial bacteria growing on the filters) some of that waste that is loaded into the carbon may leech back into your now clean tank water and cause more harm than its worth. if you run it, change it atleast once a month just to be safe, if your worrying about costs, then switch to biofilters that never need replacement. and if you cant do that due to costs, than, IMO, then properly keeping fish is out of your budget, and should not be attempted.

dont get me wrong, people "get by" with some tanks, but my feeling on it is this, if you cant do it right, dont do it at all. just for the sake of the fishies. filtration is key because the fish are infact living in a soup of their own excrement.

necromancer4 wrote:


X2

Carbon is not needed if you maintain your tank properly. In fact it can hide/remove the first early signs if things start go wrong

many argument had been said about carbon. but carbon had been invented and used
for the purpose. i used to handle filtration system of the water in a hotel where
i use to work. and carbon is one primary components required.

carbon is very effective in removing impurities and unwanted minerals.
however, it has limitation, a certain period or volume processed capacity,
and need to be replace regularly. there lies the danger... once becomes
saturated, it will leach the toxin back to the tank.

now, if you want to invest on it, it has a purpose but one can have a healthy
tank without it.

marcus wrote:




cheers for advice,
i have replaced them with "bio balls" all good now..

PAUL wrote:


There should not be any inpurities or unwanted minerals in the water or food that you put in the tank, so you dont need to use carbon. Unless of course your water is not good or you feed poor quality food

carbon is supposed tolike stop yellowing and cloudyness from the water and should be used period that is what is in the tetratec manual .which is good as tha tetra stuff is expesive. does old carbon still do the job?

By old carbon do you mean used? if so NO used carbon will leech the waste it has absorbed back into the water. Thats why carbon needs replacing after a few wks.

Carbon is not necessary in a well maintained tank. Tetratec tell you to use carbon because they want to sell it to you, and you have to replace is reguarly, its a good money earner for them

right now in each of my canisters, (along with a a tray of bio-stars, four filtration pads, and a super-micro filtration floss-pad) i have Chemi-Pure filter mediums, as recommended by my LFS. Its in a nylon bag, and it looks like the same stuff in carbon filter bags, but nowhere on the container it comes in does it say anything about having carbon in it.(it may but i dunno) It does say that it promotes aerobic bacterial growth and nitrification removes dissolved organics. removes copper metal, ions, odors, all pollution, gases, CO2, color, and phenol. rated for 4-6 months.