Carbon Filters

[GaryD]

Hi,

Today, I picked up a 1kg box of Jebo Activated Carbon.

The spiel on the box tells me that it's "high grade pelletised (in a fine mesh bag - for easy use)."

So, I'm all dressed up but I don't know where to go.

Gary

[Toga]

Hi,

Gary - Good idea to create a new thread for carbon filters. IMO carbon is overlooked far too often.

Yes, I have used carbon in very heavily stocked tanks, mainly ornamental / aquarium species & including natives. I think 1000 rainbow fish / 10x 1kg Barra in a 6x2x2 is considered very heavily stocked.
I think I covered most of your questions in the previous post.

Its so easy to use, the aquarium varieties usually come in a mesh bag as you have mentioned. Give the bag a good rinse in a bucket of fish water, fresh carbon usually has a heap of fine carbon dust in it. I prefer not to use tap water as the chlorine etc in tap water use up that little bit extra of chemical filtration I would prefer to use for the fish. The mesh bag can be placed anywhere along the water flow path, from the pre-filter / strainer, the top layer of a trickle filter, inside a canister filter, inside a basic air operated corner filter, in a filter sock prior to sump, hanging in a barrel filter... anywhere. The best place for it would be in the 'cleanest water flow', the outlet water flow from a filter, on top of grow bed... thus reducing cleaning frequency.

Cleaning / recharging carbon I touched on above, end of the day.... its a down wright pain in the tush.
What I didnt mention regarding baking / heating, obviously what ever toxins the carbon has filtered out of the water is then gassed off during the baking... the vapors & fumes of this process are not healthy ... and quite frankly, stench. Dont do it when the miss's is baking... or in the house for that matter. Im thinking I will put this bag into a metal 200ltr drum over a fire and do it outside.
Its usually too easy and affordable to simply replace the 1 or 2 bags every 5-6 months.The worst your water is, then more frequent replacement would be advised.

Jobney - yes it does remove chelated iron... to the point of maximum saturation then that is it. Over the first 8 weeks, the 25kg of carbon I put into my 10,000 ltr system absorbed nearly 400g chelated iron before it started to register on test kits. 5g / week keeps it stable and that would be plant uptake, not carbon removal of it.

Another benefit is although the carbon may have reached maximum saturation of chlorine, chelated iron, manganese or any other micro / macro elements ... it still remains active towards other 'toxins' that have not reached max saturation.

In commercial aquaculture, carbon filters are more likely to be found on fresh incoming & discharge water circulations. Other filter process's deal with daily solids removal & nitrification for water quality.

Gary - It will be very interesting to see how much extra benefit it has on your megabin system... I recon even after going through your nexus & huge bio filter... you will be blown away by how much fine solids it removes after even 2 weeks. Keep us in touch with that one... interesting indeed.

Cheers
Toga

[GaryD]

Hi Toga,

I think I covered most of your questions in the previous post.

And when I actually took the time to read it properly, I discovered that you had done exactly that. Thanks.

I'm keen to see what difference it makes. I love the idea that it captures toxins and heavy metals in addition to attracting micro-solids. With the crap that finds its way into our mains water systems (in addition to any introduced toxins embedded during the component manufacture), something that achieves that has got to be a good thing.

Thanks again, mate.

Gary

[Earthan Group]

We use carbon filters on some of our installations. In what we do, the filters are almost always used on a single pass for supply water. Within the systems there is not a great deal of chance for toxins to get into them and carbon is not very useful on a multiple pass system especially with organic load.

But useful just the same.

[GaryD]

Hi,

But useful just the same.

Given that it does nothing but lie there until its capacity to soak up toxins and micro-solids is exhausted, I'm keen to try it.

While nobody sets out to introduce toxins into a system, they can still occur. Even if only minute quantities of plasticisers, styrenes and other nasties end up (or start off) in a system, it would be good to know that activated charcoal will trap them.

Who's to know what someone might drop into a batch of feed?

My concern about small looped AP systems is just that........they are small looped systems.....and there are only two ways that things get out of such a system......we either take them out (via filtration of some type) or we ingest them when we eat the fish or plants.

Gary