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Hi !

I added a charcoal pack to my aquaclear to remove possible contaminants after a tank swap, and wondering if I remove it after a few days can I store it somehow and re-use it later (for example, if I have to remove a med) or should I just toss it..the addition of some used flourite that was washed well but may have still contained some organic 'stuff' causing a little bit of oily film.. 2 days now since charpack in but will use a couple more days longer anyway. Any thoughts ? I don't use charcoal on a regular basis in my plant tank.



The Amazon Nut...

Hi,
In the "old days" we used activated charcoal that was a
form of bone charcoal. Over time (depending upon the
bioload) the charcoal looses its effectiveness and becomes
just another form of mechanical and biological media.

To recharge it we placed it on a cookie sheet and baked
it in the oven for an hour.

Frank


-->>> The Confidence of Amateurs, is the Envy of Professionals <<<--

DaFishMan

I certainly would not use it at all. The Carbon stores all the unwanted nasties and you could end up with a very nasty mix over a short period of time.

Be safe and buy fresh all the time for replacements.

Frank I dont think I can remember that far. What I can remember was we just washed it out to save money. The reason for that was we did not know any better in those old days.
Your info was supplied by the local LFS if at all it was either sink or swim. Most info came via meeting other customers at the LFS.

Keith

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I run activated carbon on my planted tanks constantly. It hasn't had any negative effect as far as I can tell.

Hi,
Well first of all, the activated bone charcoal of yesteryear
(is that a word?) could be recharged by baking it in an
oven on a cookie sheet. It STUNK UP THE HOUSE and was not
a very good idea. For two reasons:
1. Domestic Tranquility
2. You had to turn the oven up sky high and even then there
was some debate about its effectiveness.

Today, Carbon is so inexpensive, that we just throw it
away, or add it to our terrestrial gardens when done.
Carbon only lasts, as a chemical filter, for a week to
two weeks, depending upon the bioload of the tank.
Carbon binds organic chemicals removing them from
circulating in the water and preventing them from
interacting in the water. After a while all the surfaces
get covered with the bound up organics and the carbon
then becomes just another mechanical filter that eventually
plays host to the bacterial colonies that are the engine
of the nitrogen cycle.

There is alot of discussion about having a planted tank
and running carbon as the carbon will "capture" much of the
very nutrients that we want the plants to use. Indeed, many
of the manufacturers recomend not using carbon when adding
their fertilizers. Many simply dose more but all that does
is saturate the carbon faster and make it a mechanical
filter, faster.

Personally, from what I've read, I'd remove the carbon.
In todays filtration systems, it's only really necessary
when trying to remove tannins from the water because of
leaching driftwood. It is also useful AFTER treating a
fish disease. Most medications reccomend up to a 50%
water change to dilute the medication, and then the use
of Carbon in the filter to bind up the remaining medication.

Carbon will bind up fish urea, but then you should not
be that over stocked, and the media in todays filters
will do that anyway with the bacterial colonies that
power the Nitrogen Cycle.

Frank


-->>> The Confidence of Amateurs, is the Envy of Professionals <<<--

I would throw it away &amp; buy new carbon when i'll need it.


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I did stop using charcoal recently in my main tank, but wanted to get some 'noticed nasties' out of the water on this occasion. When I did use it all the time, I didn't note the plants lacking anything out of the ordinary. I'll leave it in for now and when done with I'll pitch it, don't want the oily stuff leeching back in..
Tanks again.

The Amazon Nut...

I added some Zeo-Carb recently to my tank, as I was painting the room the fish tank was in and just in case the paint fumes were harmful/entered the tank I thought this would be good. I left it in for 2 weeks and tossed it. Seemed a waste but as mentioned the carbon only lasts a week or 2.

I just hope the rest of it in the bag is ok as I have heard that once the bags are opened the carbon can start to lose it's effects...

Use of carbon filters in chambered external filters while very effective at removing toxins quickly ,can lead to problems of their own. First by the regular use of carbon filtration you are not really addressing the initial cause of the problem, especially if youre needing to use them constantly you may have a consistantly contributing cause,like overstocking and overfeeding.This should really be addressed as soon as possible.

Carbon filter pads are handy for removing some medications after treating an animal, but those who use them regularly will not be getting the full benefit of medications added to the tank while the carbon filter is in operation.In addition carbon pads will provide less effective filtration in the long term and will need to be changed more frequently, which in a nicely balanced tank without overstocking will mean that that layer of the filter will have less time to mature into effective biological filtration.

This could seriously effect the overall performance of your filter over an extended period of time . The time taken by the colonisation of new bacteria is an issue, given that every time you change the carbon element there will be a 21 day or so period without effective biological filtration in that area of the filter, even moreso if you clean more than one of the compartments at a time .

You will need to balance your need for the removal of specific toxins , over your efficiency of normal biological filtration which might not be what you wanted, especially as the lack of regular filtration may contribute to needing to control levels of toxins that you bought the carbon filter for in the first place. A kind of cyclic dependancy on carbon, if you will.

A nice solution would be perhaps to buy a much smaller , and cheaper filter filled with carbon to help process toxins and add it to your tank in addition to your regular filter, (while never interfering with your main external filter) which can then be removed after the job is done.Not a bad idea when you could do this for about &#163;12 and the price of buying repeated stocks of (eheim for example ) carbon filters would quickly outstrip this.

I would therefore personally recommend regular biological filtration over carbon filtration unless you are specifically trying to remove certain toxins or post medication treatments from the water.

The baench marine atlas no 1 has a nice section on the properties of various filtration media, some of which applies to freshwater aquaria if youre interested.