freshwater sand

by **Serial324556** » Thu Mar 06, 2008 4:38 am

Will fine sand like quikrete playsand / pool filter sand have any effects on my HOB filter?

by **saltwaterpimp** » Thu Mar 06, 2008 6:27 am

when i first started saltwater tanks i had a hob filter and it ran fine with sand. now idk if playsand will have any affects on your filter, gumbii had sand in his freshwater tanks try to contact him.

by **Peterkarig3210** » Thu Mar 06, 2008 6:35 am

I would get a sand that has been screened so the particles aren't too small. I think when I used beach sand I put some in a bucket and ran a hose through it while mixing with my hand. All the finner particles would rinse/overflow out leaving the larger. I had unlimited amounts as I was using the sand for my garden as well, so I could afford to waste it.

by **serial32** » Thu Mar 06, 2008 4:10 pm

Yeah I went to a site that showed how to clean it well. I will try that.

by **gumbii** » Thu Mar 06, 2008 11:17 pm

i had to modify my intake tubes as far up as possible... sand still gets in my filters but hasn't destroyed anything...

i couldn't find pool filter sand... so i got target brand pool filter sand... it's light grey and was fairly easy to rinse in a bucket... also not that fine... and 5 bucks for a 50lb bag... you can't beat that...

by **Peterkarig3210** » Thu Mar 06, 2008 11:41 pm

I hope it works for you. I was thinking that sand bought for pool filters would have sharp edges and natural sand or aquarium sand would be rounder. Maybe it doesn't matter.

by **gumbii** » Fri Mar 07, 2008 12:27 am

the best stuff so far is color quartz from 3M...

http://solutions.3m.com/wps/portal/3M/e ... /Crystals/

ask around to see if you could get this in your area... it's allready clean... just rinse it out once and you're ready to go... the colors are freaken amazing...

there's a forum that has a stickied thread about it... it's long but it has numbers of places where you could find some for about 25bucks for a 50lb bag...

by **serial32** » Fri Mar 07, 2008 7:27 pm

I ended up getting quikrete premium playsand at lowes. It worked like a charm, it took me a couple hours to clean it because I only have 2 buckets but worked well. I used a plastic cup to lower it in there and the water didnt get mucky or anything. It's slightly cloudy from all the commosion but it's getting better already.
My Cichlids are going nuts in it and I was surprised as hell to find that 2 very small babies survived taking out the old gravel and putting the new sand in. Although they won't last long with my StoneFish in there he loves them for dinner.

I also took both bubblers out of there, I was reading that I don't really need them anyways and that they are mainly for looks. Is this true?

by **spongebob4460** » Fri Mar 07, 2008 9:11 pm

serial, bubblers as in air stones? so do you have any aeration left for the water (or for surface agitation)?

by **serial32** » Fri Mar 07, 2008 10:58 pm

Yes, as in air stones. I put 1 of the air stones back in for now and just set it behind the drift wood. I have to figure out a new place to put it. I had very little surface agitation, the filter was barely doing much at all to the water for aeration so I put it back in.

freshwater sand

32 posts • Page 2 of 4

freshwater sand

32 posts • Page 2 of 4