expierience with penguin 200 filter

[romsoccer12]

anyone have expierience/opinions?
i want to get one for my 29gal biocube because it fits perfect on the 2nd chamber

[Jabrams]

they are nitrate factories, total garbage for reef keeping.

That being said, what do you plan to keep in this tank? coral or fish or both?

[romsoccer12]

it already has corals and fish, im using around 50lbs of liverock, and the stock skimmer
why is it a nitrate factory? it seems like a good filter. i have a aqueon and i kinda rigged it to work better by filling it with filter sponges, and i was planning on doing the same with the penguin filter, plus adding 2 biocube filters

[capnfritz]

You asked for an opinion and got it: Nitrate factory.
Sponges are also nitrate factories, unless changed and
cleaned often.

[Jabrams]

the biowheel/sponges are the problem,they trap crap

might be just fine to run carbon through

[dcombs44]

They are a nitrate factory because the filter media will trap detritus and particulates that will be broken down into nitrates with nothing to export them. That's if you're lazy about it.

If you're religious about cleaning the sponges, they can be used on a reef tank. I'm planning to use a penguin 350 power filter on my 10 gallon nano tank.

I plan to continue using the sponges, but no bio-wheels. You could scrap the sponges and place some live rock rubble in the filter chambers and some macro algae.

If you are religious about water changes and cleaning the filter pads, you can use a power filter on a reef tank.

[dcombs44]

Another note: The use of the filter pads in or sponges in the filter chambers is basically the same practice as people using filter socks. Difference probably amounts to filter socks being a bit more effective and easier to clean.

The wet/dry concept of the bio-wheel is somewhat of an outdated one. My understanding is basically that the wheel will harbor aerobic bacteria which is only capable of converting ammonia to nitrite and nitrites to nitrates. They are not capable of converting the nitrates to nitrogen gas, so you have to export nitrates via cleaning the sponges/filter pads, and through water changes.

I'm pretty sure though that most of the bacteria in all of our tanks are aerobic. We use live rock and deep sand beds as methods to produce anaerobic bacteria, which is capable of converting the nitrates to nitrogen gas, but my understanding is that there typically aren't enough of these anaerobic zones to really make a dent in our systems, so we still end up relying on nutrient export via water changes, filter socks, macro algae, etc.

So, like I said, it can definitely work if you'll put the effort into it.

To Capnfritz, I don't think he was condemning your answer, just asking why. He just wanted support for your accusation.....

[romsoccer12]

thx for all the help.
i had such good expierience with the other smaller versions rigging them, i think i will purchase one, especially since they are on sale as of now in my LFS. Ill manage to clean once a week, would that be enough? The idea of a small refuigum is very good, but would lose the whole point because the 2nd chamber of the biocube could be turned into a larger fuge anyway.