Moving bed filters and fluid bed filtration 101 by Pondguru

Now most people will recognise this design, basically just a bottle stuck on the back of your tank, holes drilled in the top, holes drilled around the neck, air input in the bottom and moving bed media. That idea has been taken up by thousands of people all the way around the world and in this video I just want to show you exactly what happens in a moving bed and how you can get it to operate more efficiently. Now on the subject of a mature filter you can see that this media is quite discolored and it's got a lot of muck in the middle of it that's nice and mature because it's been set up about a year and if you look at how much air is coming in the bottom it's not much at all and really that's as much as your filter media needs to move it doesn't need to be smashing together and once the media is mature you can get quite a quiet filter these are the sorts of media we're going to be talking about today k1 micro standard Helx, all of these ones are plastic, and BioMotion, this is a sintered glass moving bed filter media. Hello, it's Richard from the Pond Guru channel, and in this video I'm going to be talking about moving bed filter media and moving bed filters. Oh, no. I can hear a collective groan go up from the audience. The subject's being done to death. Everybody's got moving bed filters. We know all about them, but... Hopefully, in this video, there will be some new information. For example, most people who've made moving bed filters are actually still using just the ordinary K1. There's loads of other types of media. Some people are even unaware that there's an evolved form of K1 called Helix. And quite a lot more people are blind to the fact that there's a really small version of K1 which is absolutely perfect for internal moving bed filters. Now since all you guys out there have taken that idea I came up with years ago, which was to have the moving bed filter inside your tank, you've been evolving it, you've been putting those videos out on YouTube. The K1 Micro is actually a response to all your videos. Evolution Aqua realized that there was a big market there for a small media. A media that could be used in confined spaces, i.e. the little bottles that we make our moving bed filters out of, so they actually produce one. It's also excellent for use in Koi filters as well, because it contains almost twice the surface area per volume of standard K1. But in Koi filters that are designed to take K1, you might have to make the screen, the mesh that holds the stuff in, a little bit smaller. Because it's really tiny media. Now there is a media that I forgot to mention. And that's BioMotion. That's very different to the plastic medias that are available. In that it's made of sintered glass. It's made of exactly the same material as the BioHome Mini Ultra and the BioHome Ultimate. Which are far and away the best static bed filter medias that you can get. This is a one for a moving bed and I'll explain later on the best way to use that in your aquarium, in your sump or in your koi filter. Just a little quick history of moving beds. It really started with water treatment and K1 was made in response to that. It's a very good media, it doesn't wear out, it's zero maintenance and it creates quite a fluid bed especially in a big situation like a treatment plant. Now koi keepers quickly realised that that media was also very good in home made filters for their koi ponds and after that there was proper filters that actually were designed for this moving bed. For example the Nexus filters from EA. They really took the moving bed from the treatment plants to the domestic market. So K1 was pretty much the first one that was available worldwide for use outdoors and also later indoors. A few years after K1 kind of hit the market, Helex came about. This was manufactured by Oase, a German company. And although it's a little bit bigger than K1, it's got much more protected surface area. So it's great to replace the K1 in your koi filters. When all these videos started going on YouTube, the guy who actually makes BioHome for me saw these videos on YouTube and decided to create a sintered glass moving bed media. It took quite a while for them to perfect this particular media, because it's not the easiest thing in the world to make, but it's got an absolutely ridiculous surface area compared to any of the plastic medias. And as far as surface area goes, it reigns supreme. It's got to be used in the right situations, but when it is, it's excellent. And it has the added bonus of being able to be used in a static filter, because of that big surface area where plastic media would be no good at all. Right, so that's the standard K1. Helex and BioHome. They were invented in that order. And then very recently, the people who make the ordinary K1 watched a lot of the videos on YouTube and decided to make a smaller version of the K1. Now this is in direct response to all you fellas out there taking that original idea that I had with the little bottle, doing your own videos and putting them all out on YouTube. There's thousands of them now. EA saw this and decided to make a smaller version of K1, specifically for you fellas to use in your moving bed filters, and also to be used in koi filters, and again in bubble bead filters, which is the hourglass shaped ones. As far as filter medias for confined spaces go, K1 Micro is the best. So really the upshot of all of that information I've just given you is... That you are responsible for the creation of K1 Micro. If you hadn't have put all those videos out based on that original idea, K1 Micro wouldn't exist. Now as far as actually making an internal moving bed filter, I've got loads of videos out there. Loads of other people have got videos out there. Just put it in the search engine, how to make an internal moving bed filter. And hundreds of them will come up. Now before I get into the specifics of exactly what happens in a moving bed filter and what the different types of media are and do, and I show you on moving and working properly, I'd just like to say that if you've got a video that you want people to see, just put the link to it in the comments section of this video. And that way, people who are checking in at a later date will be able to come here, not only for the information that's in this video, but they'll also be able to look down all the comments and see the links to all your different DIY moving bed filter projects. Now for the purpose of a little demonstration, I'm going to use this, and this was given to me by my good friend Michael. It's a plastic tube, siliconed on top of a big air disc. I'm going to fill it up with water and I might put some dye in as well because I know sometimes you can't see the media moving very well on film. Hopefully a bit of dye might help. This is the K1 Micro in here. Look at the way it's moving. Absolutely chaotic motion. Never goes the same way twice. Sometimes it goes down, sometimes it comes up. It even moves left to right and all the time banging into each other. And whenever it bangs into each other, old bacteria is knocked off and that leaves space for new bacteria. And the new, very vigorous, eager bacteria that's living on this media is exceptionally difficult to dislodge, very strong, and it feeds on ammonia and nitrite. So this is one of the fastest ways to get rid of ammonia and nitrite in your tank or in your pond. Now the one drawback with using a moving bed filter with plastic media is it tends to produce quite a lot of nitrate it strips out ammonia and nitrite very quickly very efficiently but it does produce quite a lot of nitrate so say you had it in a sump under your aquarium you'd have the water coming down through your foams into your moving bed filter and then ideally you would want it Going into a static bed filter, i.e. where the media does not move, and for that you would want something like Biohome. Check that out, it's in numerous other videos. Biohome is excellent media, the best you could possibly get, and it will remove the nitrates if used in the right quantity. In a similar way in a pond system you'd have your pump feeding into your filter mechanical filtration would occur then it would go into here which would strip out ammonia and nitrite and in an ideal world the water would then flow through a shower filter so a pipe would spray or drop water through foams and then through media trays of media stacked on top of each other. I'll put a quick video up now of just such a system in a Koi dealer's place. And that would do exactly the same job as the bio-home in the sump. It would strip out the nitrates. So the end of your filtration process will have the full cycle done. Ammonia, nitrite and nitrate will be gone. If you only use this as your biological filtration, you will get a lot of nitrates and you will have to do quite a lot of water changes. And I've got to say, normally the water obviously wouldn't be blue like this, but I've dyed it blue just so you can see the media that much easier. Because with this being a clear tube, the media being white, it's not very easy to see it moving on film. By staining the water blue, it makes it stand out a little bit more, and it creates a beautiful effect. So, as far as moving bed medias go, the K1 Micro is far and away the most fluid bed you can get. If you've already got a DIY moving bed filter in your tank, and it's full of ordinary K1, If you swap that for K1 Micro, It'll do twice the filtering job or you could make the filter half as big and it would still do the same job and that makes a hell of a difference. But as far as surface area goes there is a better moving bed media although it isn't really suited to small situations and that's it there that's bio motion and what you'll find in small situations if you have it moving as violently as that it will break up. If you have your air injection just at one side, so that the media comes up here, down here, up and down, up and down, up and down, really flies around in a cyclical motion, that will make the media last a hell of a lot longer, it won't bash into each other, and that is an awesome way to really filter a hell of a lot of water in a very confined space. The beauty of this is, if you decided to take your moving bed filter out of your tank, or you decided to change your sump design this will work just as well in a static filter so you can still keep that whereas the plastic moving bed media is absolutely hopeless in a static situation moving bed yes static no it just does not have the surface area to be of any use whatsoever Now although this is moving beautifully and it'll be a bit of a shame to empty this out, I am going to empty it out and I shall put the bio motion in here and see if I can get a cyclical motion going to show you how you should have your moving bed filters if you're using the bio home. And actually just a quick note, this form of bio home is actually called bio motion so it's quite an easy one to remember. Okay so there's the bio motion in, it's moving fairly nicely and bear in mind this is just brand new media. I've turned the air down a little bit and it's still moving really really well. When it matures it'll move even better. Now with this being sintered glass it only takes two to three weeks to fully mature. The plastic medias that I showed you before can take up to six months. That's a massive difference. But this one has to be treated with care. Ideally you need it in a big container. It's not perfect for small internal filters unless it's in a static environment. Too much air in this and it will break it. Now I'm just going to demonstrate what I meant before when I said cyclical motion. I tip it to one side that's more of a cyclical motion. It's going round and round and round just like a washing machine. The air probably is a little bit too violent in there. I could do with turning that down a bit but that is the most efficient way to use the bio motion in a cyclical motion. Now this stuff really is unique. There's no other sintered glass moving bed media. All the copies of the stuff that I've shown you are plastic. This is sintered glass that has a ridiculously massive surface area. So it means you can make your filters really small. Ideally, you want a static bed for that. Or you can make them big and have it in a cyclical motion. And this stuff will absolutely hammer ammonia and nitrite. But with it having a core a little bit like a honeycomb. It'll also support anaerobic bacteria which will reduce nitrate and that's something that you don't get from the other types of moving bed media. One last thing that isn't connected to media is about bacteria. Bacteria in a moving bed filter is absolutely of utmost importance. The plastic filter media takes four to six months to mature which is a hell of a long time. But plastic isn't very conducive to bacterial growth. It generally hasn't got a very big surface area and bacteria doesn't like to grow on it. That's why it takes so long. These fellas can help. Now this isn't exotic caviar or frog spawn. These are little gel balls. And each one of these balls contains millions of live bacteria. You'll have seen these on all my bio-home videos. And these are essential to kick-start your moving bed filter. And these were designed by the people who designed the K1 and the K1 Micro just to be used in with the media. And they swirl around with the media. And they'll take between two or three days to a week to dissolve in a moving bed filter. And every time they bump into a piece of plastic, They'll release a bit of bacteria onto that plastic. The plastic might not want to take that bacteria, but if it's constantly getting bombarded with bacteria, eventually some will stick. And when that bacteria sticks, it'll multiply. So this speeds up the development a lot. All of those different types of media and the balls are available on my eBay shop. Just check the link out. It's in the video description. And thank you very much for watching. I'll catch you next time.