Powerhead
- Thread starter TradeWinds
- Start date
Do you have a normal filter in your tank? in my opinion a ugf isn't all that important if you have a filter cause ugf's are a pain to clean. I dont really see a need to have a reverse flow powerhead cause you wouldn't like to shoot all that poo into the water. If you are gonna get the powerhead i think the weakest powerhead available is a good choice, maybe like 100gph ish? that'll give a good amount of movement.
Balloon Fish said:
the thing with ugf's are they aren't really the best filters to use but it does still work... and then the cleaning part is a pain... but other then that the 100gph ish speed is still a good choice for the powerhead and the only purpose of a powerhead is for creating water flow 
'winds
I thought when using a powerhead with a UGF, you used reverse flow to purposely shoot the poo out in order to have another filter pick it up (i.e. HOB power filter, or canister, or whatever)... and thus the reverse flow was for the maintenance/cleaning of the UGF to make sure the UGF didn't get too dirty and inefficient.
you had an HOB and never used it!! i think HOBs are a lot better then UGFs cause its better filtration all together. UGFs are mainly for more surface area for bacteria to live on and not realy a strong filtration system. If you really wanna keep the UGF i would get a reverseflow powerhead to connect to it then shoot everything out of the water everytime you wanna clean it but in my opinio the HOB is already enough filtration.
i think HOBs are a lot better then UGFs cause its better filtration all together. UGFs are mainly for more surface area for bacteria to live on and not realy a strong filtration system. If you really wanna keep the UGF i would get a reverseflow powerhead to connect to it then shoot everything out of the water everytime you wanna clean it but in my opinio the HOB is already enough filtration.
Balloon Fish said:
you had an HOB and never used it!! i think HOBs are a lot better then UGFs cause its better filtration all together. UGFs are mainly for more surface area for bacteria to live on and not realy a strong filtration system. If you really wanna keep the UGF i would get a reverseflow powerhead to connect to it then shoot everything out of the water everytime you wanna clean it but in my opinio the HOB is already enough filtration.
i think HOBs are a lot better then UGFs cause its better filtration all together. UGFs are mainly for more surface area for bacteria to live on and not realy a strong filtration system. If you really wanna keep the UGF i would get a reverseflow powerhead to connect to it then shoot everything out of the water everytime you wanna clean it but in my opinio the HOB is already enough filtration.
http://honors.montana.edu/~weif/firsttank/power.phtml
http://honors.montana.edu/~weif/firsttank/ugf.phtml
The UGF seems a lot better after reading those two pages, and I decided to not even set up the HOB that came with my tank after reading them. And the guy who runs that site seems to know what he's talking about. I'm not trolling/flaming or anything, just saying that that's why I use a UGF rather than the HOB that came with my tank.
What do you all think?
BTW, the HOB that came with my tank is a Tetra Whisper.
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omg lol i've never heard of anyone talk about how bad an HOB is by saying how much they caused evaporation... Although it isn't the best filtration compared to canisiter filters and other filters it is above UGF's on my list. First off, HOBs nowadays have this little curve at the bottom where the water flows out of so it can redirect the water to shoot forward instead of downward (most filters do at least). Also evaporation isn't even a problem because you have to do your weekly water changes anyways and in normal tanks that are covered you can barely notice any evaporation until like 2 weeks of not doing a water change. Also, increasing the surface area is a good thing, meaning there is more oxygen exchange which means you can keep more fish... and the whole water falling into the water puts even mroe oxygen in the water. As for the filter pads, that is why people don't throw the filter pads away and instead just wash it a little in the old tank water to keep all the bacteria in there and use the same pad for a few months... I think this guy had some big problems with HOB filters so he keeps saying all these bad things about it and sounds so negative about it, cause he did say something about the HOB leaking which probably indicates he had an HOB once and it broke or something . Anyways, i think if you do get the powerhead on the UGF it is a good amount of filtration but if you wanna attach the HOB so you dont have to take out the poop yourself then go for it (but you'll still need to clean the filter pad). In my opinion the HOB is already enough cause it provides enough surface area for bacteria to grow on, and on the filter media, and it provides a good amount of mechanical filtration and when you do water changes just vacuum the gravel and it should be enough
. Anyways, i think if you do get the powerhead on the UGF it is a good amount of filtration but if you wanna attach the HOB so you dont have to take out the poop yourself then go for it (but you'll still need to clean the filter pad). In my opinion the HOB is already enough cause it provides enough surface area for bacteria to grow on, and on the filter media, and it provides a good amount of mechanical filtration and when you do water changes just vacuum the gravel and it should be enough actually reverse flow ugf are usually recommended. An ugf has an enormous amount of surface area for bio filteration. The downside to them is that the gravel often gets clogged with debris that gets trapped in it and prevents water flow and dirties the water. reverse flow pushes the water through instead of sucking it in keeping the gravel from getting clogged and allows debris to be filtered out by the other filter.