To bleach, or not to bleach...

[Snausy]

I'm cleaning my Eheim wet/dry filter WITH ceramic media in it. I'm done running it overnight with almost pure vinegar. Now I've rinsed it several times, run it with clean water for a day, changing several times. It doesn't smell like vinegar at all now.

The next step would be bleach...some of you say no big deal do the bleach....but some of you think I'm crazy for considering bleach at all.

#1 Does the vinegar kill bacteria and thorougly clean it or does it just get rid of calcium and other deposits...it was all dry for months before this...

#2 If I DO bleach, now long should I run the solution through the filter? Half an hour? Is that too long?

Would you bleach the filter with ceramic media in it to be thorough and positive it's sterile or not?

Thanks for any help from people who KNOW. I come here for help and knowlege.

[WaterKeeper]

Well, not sterile but pretty close to it. Usually running about a cup of bleach per gallon of water is a good way to clean a ceramic filter. Not only does it kill bacteria but it dissolves their bodies as well as cleaning out algae that gets into the pore structure of the filter. Recirculating it for a hour or two is usually enough unless the filter is heavily clogged. A couple of fresh water rinses are then used.

The danger is if there is always a chance of bleach residue remaining. If one allows the filter to dry completely overnight tends to prevent that from happening. Another method is to add some aquarium declor to the final rinse water.

[DrBDC]

You should be ok w/just a vinegar cleaning. If you decide to go ahead and do bleach solution as well just add a cup to a 5 gallon bucket, run it for 1/2 hour or so and then a rinse w/regular water first, then a fresh rinse water with some dechlorinator. If you have a few days to run it w/regular water for rinsing, you could even get away w/o dechlorinator although I would use it to be on the safe side. Maybe change the rinse water a couple times if you do it w/o.

[Snausy]

I'm thinking of rinsing like crazy after the bleach then baking the media in the oven @ 400 degrees for a couple hours making sure it's dry.

The bleach in the pores of the media was a concern to me.

[WaterKeeper]

The oven trick works fine too. If you evaporate all the pore entrained water it will lose any free residuals of chlorine. I do that with base rock that has been bleached all the time. Do it Green though as 300-350_ is fine.

Actually, baking for three hours at 350 will get you a sterile media. More so than the bleach which is only a sanitizing agent. The main reason to use bleach is to remove the organic gook that clogs the pores. Repeated baking without a bleach step can leave carbon residue to clog things up.

[DrBegalke]

Not even bleach will make something truly sterile.

I would stick with the vinegar.

[WaterKeeper]

I thought steam at 250°F @15 psi for 15 minutes, baking at 350°F for 180 minutes, using ETO, soaking in glutaraldehyde overnight or irradiation with UV or gamma would usually foot the bill Doc? That's why I said that the oven trick was even better than bleach.

Then again, I'm often wrong.

Actually the use of bleach is mainly to remove algae and such that can create carbon deposits if merely baked. We are attempting to open clogged pore more so than sterilize or disinfect.