I'm looking into a pool pump\sand filter setup but have read alot of cons regarding sand filters....so my question is, what besides sand can I use in a sand filter. I recently bought alot of filter bags with a type of hard sponge material inside and was wondering if I had to fill a sand filter up with these bags if that would be ok??

Or does it have to be sand......please advise

I have read about the bubble bead system but can imagine that to be quite expensive having to buy all those seperately......what else is a good idea re sand filter????

thanks

You generally use sand that is 3-5mm in a sand filter. As long as you mash it up inside once a week and backwash you shouldn't have any baddies.

Look at Pieter De Villiers' ponds.. Feed garlic and clean with sand filters and he never has issues

I am using hair curlers in one of my sand filters and it works well. With curlers, you decrease the mechanical filtration and increase the biological filtration. On this pond, I do not have a biofilter yet and the sand filter acts as both.

On one of my other sand filters, I use 12 mm building gravel. I use this on a large 100 000 l pond that is exposed to dust and a lot of dirt on my farm. I found that the normal 5 mm gravel blocked the flow too fast because of the exposure. Same here, you decrease your mechanical filtration as small dirt particles will go through, but from a biological filtration point of view, it is better.

Bioballs will also work with the same effect as above.

I can not see why your hard sponge material will not work but you might not have sufficient mechanical filtration, and at the end of the day, that is the main function of a sand filter. Sand filters are not great biological filters, because of the lack of oxygen.

Bubble bead filters have air compressors which solve the problem. If you can ad oxygen to a normal sandfilter, you basically have a bubble bead filter, although the direction of flow is different.

Thanks for the response.....

Paul......do you only have the sand filter with hair curlers running as you filtration on this particular setup, does this serve as mechanical and bio filter???.......if so how's your backwashes etc being done and is this setup effective.

I'm just wondering if I only had a pool pump, with sandfilter filled with medium acting as mechanical\bio with a UV how effective this would be and if backwashes would still clear out all my solids???

Sand filter on it's own can work for a while or if your stocking density is very low, but is mainly designed for mechanical filtration.

It is not an ideal bio filter because of the following:

1 Lack of oxygen, Nitrosomonas and Nitrobacter, being your two main nitrifying bacteria that breaks down Ammonia and Nitrites need a lot of oxygen.
2 The flow rate of a sand filter is normally to high. The Ammonia and Nitrite filled water needs sufficient contact with the nitrifying bacteria and if the flow rate is too high, it is not that effective.
3 Sand filters tend to clog up, taking the surface area for growth of nutrifying bacteria away.
4 In general, the surface area provided by a sand filter is not enough for a 10 000 liter pond(depending on stocking levels)

A fairly good option for you would be to run a bakki shower / trickle tower with your sand filter, to increase bio filtration and in the same process, add a lot of oxygen to your system. Alternatively, just add an ultrazap filter.

Now I know why people don't like sand filters!!! They don't understand the workings of sand filters!

Sand filters are the best mechanical filters ever, nothing else clean water like they do.

There is no lack of oxygen in Sand filters or in water filtered by sand filters, the oxygen stays in the water! A sand filter can’t remove any oxygen from the water.
Sand filters can be used as bio filters (even with sand) if they are placed inline after another sand filter!(A mechanical filter)
A “sealed” bio filter, with bio balls is usually in use after a sand filter.

See: by Chris Neaves...............
http://www.koi4u.co.za/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=23:use-and-abuse-of-high-rate-sand-filters-for-the-21st-century-koi-keeper&catid=6:chris-on-koi&Itemid=33

The growth of bacteria and the contact with bacteria regarding the water flow is irrelevant! It will grow anyway.

See: by Chris Neaves...........
http://www.koi4u.co.za/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=27:flow-rates-let-the-river-run&catid=6:chris-on-koi&Itemid=33

Using a sand filters “shell” with any bio media, will work a bio filter as long as this is placed after the mechanical filter

True, sandfilters can not remove oxygen from the water, but bacteria exposed to for instance contant water falling on them like in a bakki shower/trickle tower or other filters will grow faster en better than those in the sandfilter because there is more oxygen available to them(not only from the water but the atmosphere.

Flowrate/contact time with bacteria in my opinion definately affects the working of a biofilter. I believe that you need a fairly slow flowrate through the bacteria to enable it to do it's job properly.

Hi Paul,

wat het jy gerook!?

Daar is geen waarde wat jy nou se nie, daar is geen verskil in die bakteriese groei nie!
Alge groei wel vinniger in direkte sonlig, maar dit is waar dit eindig.

Bakterise aanslag in die water en op voorwerpe in die water, se groei is afhanklik van die "voedsel" wat in die water is. Die verskil; in suurstof bepaal nie die groei daarvan nie, maar wel die lewensduur van die bakterie.

So as jy die water toevoer na bevoorbeeld die sandfilter afsny en die suurstof opgebruik word sal net sekere bakteriese liggaampies dood gaan ander sal wel nog voortlewe.

Die "goeie" Bakterie sal benadeel word maar die "slegte" sal daar uit baat.

Nitrosomonas is bv. afhanklik van die pH en groei die beste in 'n pH 8.0 - 8.8; waar die verlaging van pH 7.00 en onder die "biomass" in die filter kan beskadig.
In water met pH 5-6 sal daar geen "biofilter" bakteriese groei wees nie, ongeag van enige suurstof! Alhoewel bakterie soos die Aeromonas familie daarvan hou.

Verder tot die argument; vinnige lopende water bevat meer suurstof as stadig lopende water!

Admin wrote:

Flowrate/contact time with bacteria in my opinion definately affects the working of a biofilter. I believe that you need a fairly slow flowrate through the bacteria to enable it to do it's job properly.

Conversion of Ammonia to Nitrite and Nitrite to Nitrate is instant. Flow rate is irrelevant.
I do agree there are better filters on the market, I also love Bakki Showers

Hi Cliff,
Try using 6mm zeolite granules in the sand filter. It still works as a very good mechanical filter but because the zeolite is lighter than sand it back-washes easier and better.

It all depends on what you want to use the sand filter primarily for - mechanical filtration or biologicial filtration.

Sand filter work really well as mechanical filters. Like all filters they need maintenance. Don't be fooled by advertising claims that there are filters on the market that do not need cleaning. Every filter needs to be cleaned regularly.

Just watch the flow rates through sand filters. Flow rates are very important in the overall scheme of things. Sand filter are very restrictive of flow rates so you need to match the number of sand filter to the volume of the pond.

Regards,
Chris

Remember if you use Zeolite, don't add salt to your pond otherwise the zeolite will release the ammonia it absorbed.

How often do you need to take the Zeolite out to clean with salt to get rid of the Ammonia?

Can Zeolite be used in a newly site up pond? Ammonia is highly toxic to fish and this product will remove it but you also need ammonia to start the Bio Filter process. Is there any special procedure to follow in a new pond?

Hi Marius,

The addition of zeolite to a sand filter is to reduce the weight of the media so that back-washing is better and therefore the sand filter has less chance of clogging.

The clogging in a sand filter is often a result of incorrect pump to sand filter bed size ratio. You need a ,75 pump to back wash a 24 inch sand filter properly. Also the clogging is a result of the bacterial slime found in all filters. It is just compacted in the sand filter which is why the sand tends to stick together on the very top of the sand bed. Sand filters do clog up (as do any mechanical filters on a koi pond) because they work so well.

When you add the zeolite it will adsorb the ammonia in the pond water. Nothing wrong with that. During this time the nitrifying bacteria (and the heterotropic bacteria) start to grow on the zeolite chips. When the zeolite is saturated with ammonia it simply becomes a media for bacterial growth. You do not have to remove the chips. You are using the zeolite not to remove ammonia but as a media for bacterial growth.

Many other "types" of filters are simply sand filter chambers with expensive light media. This light media breaks up and back-washes more efficiently than gravel or zeolite. Unless it is a fine media it does not so the same job of trapping the solids as gravel.

You can get plastic media that is denser than water - i.e. it will sink that is 2 mm or so - but be prepared to take out a second bond on your house to pay for it.

Have a look at filters with different eyes and you will see what I mean when I say they are only sand filters (pressurized filters) adapted for use on koi ponds.

In reality there are only two types of filters - open filters and pressurized or closed filters. Each has certain parameters that should be used to get them to work properly on koi ponds.

Regards,
Chris

Hi Marius,

Yes zeolite can be used on a new pond. But this defeats the object of getting the nitrifying bacteria to grow as quickly as possible. The growth of nitrifying bacteria is stimulated by the presence of ammonia.

You can control the build-up of ammonia in a new pond by keeping the number of koi down. You can control the ammonia by not feeding teh fish or feeding them every second day and then only a very small amount.

Alternatively get hold of some media from an established pond - a few hands full - add this to your filter media and your filter will start up very, very quickly. The mature media you add will have the bacteria to convert ammonia and nitrite growing on it. So your filter will start with a bang and there will be no delay in getting the nitrites out.

Again with a seeded filter do not over stock - for a few weeks and do not over feed. But you will see results immediately.

Regards,
Chris

Thanks Chris for clearing up the issue about the Zeolite. I was always concerned about the ammonia issue and the new pond. It makes sense that it will do a proper job 1s saturated. I have just learned something new again. Thanks again.

Emailed Prately about pricing on zeolite, the one sales consultant advised me on a new product they have just launched which I have received from them in pdf and word format. I am just unsure on how to host a pdf\doc file here.

Maybe I can email this to someone and they host it here???

Seems interesting and definitely worth the read......claims it removed ammonia from water etc etc

copy and paste rather ;p

Hi,

copy & paste!

it's not a link, they were documents emailed to me so cannot copy and paste as they're physical documents on my local pc

I'll do a screen dump and host as an image

here we go..

Hi,
Thanks Cliff -

I wonder what the difference is between their zeolite and their clinosorb?

As far as I can see it is simply all zeolite but different sizes. Zeolite is mined as rocks then processed through crushers to give garvel size pieces and right down to a powder.
It is a remarkable substance and there are different grades mined in different parts of the world - much like bentonite.

Zeolite - the fine granules or powder can also remove odors. Sprinkle on the carpet leave over night then vacuum.

You can make water filters with it. Filters tap water rally well - very similar to activated charcoal.

There was a blend of bentonite and zeolite powder on the market some years ago. Worked very well in ponds.

Under a microscope zeolite looks remarkably like siporax. It has a massive surface area.

Regards,
Chris

I use sand mixed with some gravel in my sandfilter. Must say, the weekly backwash/stir with the hand is a bit of a pain.

With zeolite, will that still be necessary or can one just backwash?

Then the price for a 2 bag sandfilter- on Pratley's website, they mention Clinobrite 814 and Pratley Clino Natural Zeolite, but no prices. Has anyone got an idea of the price?

But I'm jumping the gun. Im filling my pond since last night. Will be 16 000l- double the size of the previous one

Price is R143 for a 50kg bag