Bio Balls, yes or no?

I am now a firm believer that they are nitrate factories. I removed them from both my wet/drys and made fuges in their place.

 

I also am starting to lean towards the idea that BB are not that great. I cant for sure say it was the BB that was keeping my tank at 20ppm of No3 b/c I changed so many things on my system, that I cant point my finger at one factor. I will say this thou, 3-4 weeks after removing 90% of the BB, my No3 went to a big fat ZERO. Luna

 

I am in the process right now of removing my bio-balls from the sump and adding on a fuge. I am removing them at the rate of 1/4 per week. I have not seen any ammonia or nitrate what so ever, and my nitrates have gone from 20-10 so far.

 

I'm going to go against everyone on here and say bio balls are a bad call=)

 

im going to say if you already have a fuge you don't need the bb, just added noise is what a wet/dry is. if you have enough LR in the main tank it should be fine.

IMO wet/drys are kinda out dated unless your doing FO( that has a bigger bioload then what is acceptable in a reef) you don't need the added aerobic bacteria zone.

 

I hated all the debris that collected in and under them. I switched to a sock and at least it can be pulled and throw another in. The only thing I dont like about the sock is that the little pods get trapped in it. I have to get them out by holding the sock in the water and letting them swim out.

 

sounds good guys the ball are gone (any one want to buy a wet/dry)

 

I threw mine away, I even had a half bucket of new bio balls that never got used.

 

I was nervous about removing them. I did 1/4 every week and have 2 more weeks to go and my nitrates also went from 20 to 10. I have a new sump coming and I wont be using any bio balls.