Carbon or NO carbon??

activate carbone purify the water remove the colore and smell ,good quality carboon must be used. many problems associated with the type pf carbone available in the hoppy ,even under very fancy name like china made carbone . some activated carbone if you clean it will shine thise is not activated carbone to be avoid thise type.

 

Only down side (if you will) is that you must stay on top of changing it, if not, the pollutants it removed start to leech back into the tank and at a more concentrated level.

 

We run carbon 24/7. When we first added it, we noticed differences in the tank almost immediately. We just run a filter bag packed loosely with carbon (don't stuff the bag, just fill it where it's loose, like a bean bag) and let the water from the display fall onto that when it goes into our fuge.

We change our carbon every 3 months or so. There's no real way to tell when you should change it, except Otty's elegance coral pretty much "tells" him when it needs to be changed.

 

I notice that our tank water gets that fishy/coral smell when we're due for a carbon change. Thankfully, Tangster changes it often enough so that he doesn't have to hear me complain about the smell

 

I run it 24/7 too. I change it once a month.

 

Run it 7 days a month. It works quickly to remove any toxins or pollutants. (in a matter of a day or two it seems)

However, there has been evidence that most carbon (even that high quality stuff) will leech phosphates into the tank. Also other research articles suggest that it absorbs more than just pollutants and quite possibly amino acids/minerals. I have no idea how accurate this is- but if my one week a month schedule works fine, I see no reason in upping the frequency.