How clean is it really? (Sponge filters)

[nabokovfan87]

Hello Everyone,

I don't want this to come off as a rant or anything of the sorts, but I am a bit miffed and frustrated with my sponge filters.  I enjoy them, but they have been causing headaches and frustrations.  I want to ask for some help, have a bit of fun, and make a sort of game out of it. 

[Setting the scene]

Do you ever clean your sponge filter for a very long time and notice what happens when you try to place it back into your tank?  Does it spew out fine particles all over the place right away?  Do you feel like you need an elephant trunk or a power washer to be able to really get that thing rinsed off?

I swear this is not exaggeration, I washed this thing in the sink, not going back into the tank, for a solid 20 minutes.  I squeezed and squeezed and squeezed and you can sense the pressure changes, flip it around and squeeze it in different orientations to get as much of the gunk out.  You fill it back up with water, squeeze, and the water is clear.... DONE.  Or is it?

The Test
1. Clean your filter using any method you normally would and you consider it to be clean.
2. Take a photo of the sponge out of water that appears "cleaned."
3. Take a specimen container and fill it with water and place your sponge inside.  Try not to squeeze it, but place it inside.
4.  Take a photo to show clarity of the water beforehand.
5.  Squeeze it into the bottom of the specimen container a few times.  The more the merrier.
6.  Take a photo and review to see if your water is clean, meaning the filter is clean.

Here's mine....

Hikari Sponge Filter, I believe it's the large size.  Same size and sits on a co-op large base.



In person, you cannot see any tinge of brown or BBA, but you can definitely see it on the photo.  Of course there's bba on it.... 😩

This is before the test


After...... and this is after trying to clean it quite a few more times to clear it out.


I don't want to waste water, I don't want to clean this thing for an eternity, and the result of struggles like this has been to use certain methods to minimize the time/effort and make it easier on myself.  The main goal is as mentioned above... I don't want to place that thing in the tank and end up making it cloudy just by being in the water.  I have it happen all the time with the prefilter on the canister and basically have to pressure wash the thing on some days.

Thanks to everyone ahead of time who participates. I'm curious to see the good and the bad.

[Guppysnail]

I use the ACO coarse sponges. A few squeezes until I feel water flow easy and a few more for good measure and back it goes. Maybe a few loose particles still float but not enough for me to care. 
I do t want my sponges too clean.  The more I clean the more good bacteria is destroyed.  

I just squish them in used tank water.  My tap is so over chlorinated (think public swimming pool bad) 

So I can’t share in the fun but I’m curious why you want all the bacteria destroyed.  All that brown isn’t bad stuff. 

[nabokovfan87]

On 9/28/2024 at 5:45 AM, Guppysnail said:

So I can’t share in the fun but I’m curious why you want all the bacteria destroyed.  All that brown isn’t bad stuff. 

I knew it was gonna come up! 😂

I definitely don't want to kill the biological colony. I run a TON of air on my stuff and most of my tanks are high circulation/aeration. This isn't a preference just for the sake of it, but because of the things inside and their behavior. The issue im having of late is that any sort of fine or medium-fine sponge gets to the point of literally not flowing water.

Beyond that, things like the easy flow caused some issues because water just didn't flow through the sponge anymore to the point where the air was slowed down to practically not moving. It's my own fault because of the sponge I am using because of the setup and animal requirement.  I promise you, I couldn't kill the bacteria if I tried because it's that difficult to get things clean.

I'm very, very familiar with trying to clean off the co-op sponge in various forms. Snap some photos just to give an idea of what your preferences are and then we can compare and people can visually see what "clean" means. I absolutely understand it is very different for different people. That's the basic premise here. Get the data, see what we see.

I can give my experience trying to clean/use the co-op sponge and I'm sure I have a photo around here somewhere, but I don't want anyone to think anything positive or negative about this process.  Do what you normally do, show the group, and let's just try to see what happens.

Edited September 29 by nabokovfan87
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