Filter socks and sps

[Chameleon]

I use bleach on the filter socks to kill off the organics. Washing them in Rodi and letting them set to dry out offers nothing, just putting the same thing back in that you took out.

uggghh...
So according to you 'killing' organics is what is needed? I hate to break it to you but organics by definition are dead.
Bleach may change few bonds here and break a few bonds there through the process of oxidation leading to slightly altered organic matter composition, but in no way does it remove organics.

Your best bet at removing the organics from the filter sock...which is your goal in washing I presume....is to do it mechanically. With or without bleach doesn't matter. RODI is fine as well as tap which many use.

Bleach will however give the appearance of being cleaner as many pigment producing organics will be altered structurally into a form that does not produce visible color therefore your filter sock will be nice and white.

Now back to organisms and bleach...that is a different story. Bleach will kill just about any living cell through a variety of mechanisms including cell surface disruption, protein denaturing/aggregation, changes in oxidative environment driving other sub-cellular processes such as programmed cell death. Will the death and disruption of the cells help them become free from your filter sock? Well that kind of depends on the nature of the bacteria to begin with and whether its insides are more 'sticky' than its outsides. A little detergent goes a long way here as it can disrupt interactions of lipid membranes and polysaccharide chains with other stuff, but we dont want to use detergent on something that goes in our reef. That brings us back to mechanical removal of the organics/organisms, which happens with or without bleach when washing.

Now if your goal really is to remove all organics your best bet would be a low pH solutiuon as most organic bonds are acid labile and will break in time at low pH. I have no idea how long this would take however pH in the range or 2-4 will get the job done with the lower the pH probably speeding the process, and many synthetic plastic materials such as some filter socks could withstand the low pH with bond hydrolysis.

sorry for the rant, just dont like completely false information from being propagated as true

 

[CastAway]

uggghh...
So according to you 'killing' organics is what is needed? I hate to break it to you but organics by definition are dead.
Bleach may change few bonds here and break a few bonds there through the process of oxidation leading to slightly altered organic matter composition, but in no way does it remove organics.

Your best bet at removing the organics from the filter sock...which is your goal in washing I presume....is to do it mechanically. With or without bleach doesn't matter. RODI is fine as well as tap which many use.

Bleach will however give the appearance of being cleaner as many pigment producing organics will be altered structurally into a form that does not produce visible color therefore your filter sock will be nice and white.

Now back to organisms and bleach...that is a different story. Bleach will kill just about any living cell through a variety of mechanisms including cell surface disruption, protein denaturing/aggregation, changes in oxidative environment driving other sub-cellular processes such as programmed cell death. Will the death and disruption of the cells help them become free from your filter sock? Well that kind of depends on the nature of the bacteria to begin with and whether its insides are more 'sticky' than its outsides. A little detergent goes a long way here as it can disrupt interactions of lipid membranes and polysaccharide chains with other stuff, but we dont want to use detergent on something that goes in our reef. That brings us back to mechanical removal of the organics/organisms, which happens with or without bleach when washing.

Now if your goal really is to remove all organics your best bet would be a low pH solutiuon as most organic bonds are acid labile and will break in time at low pH. I have no idea how long this would take however pH in the range or 2-4 will get the job done with the lower the pH probably speeding the process, and many synthetic plastic materials such as some filter socks could withstand the low pH with bond hydrolysis.

sorry for the rant, just dont like completely false information from being propagated as true

+1 Excellent...

 

[Skiboat]

I have been using 7" 200 micron filter sock for years, they work great for me! My 125 gallon coral dominated tank is loaded with SPS, LPS, Softies, you name it. They grow like crazy and all fish are very healthy.

Here's what I do:
I cut a 1" hole in the bottom of my sock to allow for nutrients, copepods & amphipods to pass through. I pull tem every 3-5 days to clean, I replace them annually.

How I clean:
1. Pull sock out place in a clean 5 gallon bucket.
2. First turn sock inside out and rinse out with a garden hose.
3. Then turn sock right side in and rinse again with the garden hose again.
4. Then fill the 5 gallon bucket about half full with regular water and add a cup of bleach, then throw the sock right in.
5. I'll let it sit in there for 1 hour or till the next day; depends on how lazy I get... lol
6. Then ill take it out of the bleach water and rinse it out with the garden hose thoroughly, and then let dry completely for a day or two.

Never had any problems!

 

[Reef head]

uggghh...
So according to you 'killing' organics is what is needed? I hate to break it to you but organics by definition are dead.
Bleach may change few bonds here and break a few bonds there through the process of oxidation leading to slightly altered organic matter composition, but in no way does it remove organics.

Your best bet at removing the organics from the filter sock...which is your goal in washing I presume....is to do it mechanically. With or without bleach doesn't matter. RODI is fine as well as tap which many use.

Bleach will however give the appearance of being cleaner as many pigment producing organics will be altered structurally into a form that does not produce visible color therefore your filter sock will be nice and white.

Now back to organisms and bleach...that is a different story. Bleach will kill just about any living cell through a variety of mechanisms including cell surface disruption, protein denaturing/aggregation, changes in oxidative environment driving other sub-cellular processes such as programmed cell death. Will the death and disruption of the cells help them become free from your filter sock? Well that kind of depends on the nature of the bacteria to begin with and whether its insides are more 'sticky' than its outsides. A little detergent goes a long way here as it can disrupt interactions of lipid membranes and polysaccharide chains with other stuff, but we dont want to use detergent on something that goes in our reef. That brings us back to mechanical removal of the organics/organisms, which happens with or without bleach when washing.

Now if your goal really is to remove all organics your best bet would be a low pH solutiuon as most organic bonds are acid labile and will break in time at low pH. I have no idea how long this would take however pH in the range or 2-4 will get the job done with the lower the pH probably speeding the process, and many synthetic plastic materials such as some filter socks could withstand the low pH with bond hydrolysis.

sorry for the rant, just dont like completely false information from being propagated as true

Organic - def. Of relating to or derived from a living matter. Are we also going to argue the word "the"? Bleach isn't to used to "break" down the organics, when the filter sock overflows is a pretty good indication it is full and no longer serviceable. I use to rinse them with straight water and the would still stink. What is the stink coming from? Nitrates and phoshates? Organics ?

 

[GHill762]

I never ran them on my last tank, I do use them on my current tank.. my sps are healthier in the new tank (not saying socks are the reason why), my sps grow okay, I see no reason to stop.. I also wash them in the washer, one cycle with bleach and hot water (set to "small load" for minimal water), a second with no bleach and cold water (set to "extra large load" for a lot of rinse water).. I've never had an issue.. they usually don't even smell like bleach after the second cycle.. I think I prefer no socks, but I appreciate the sump staying a little cleaner and there being less particulate in the water..

 

[zesty]

Organic - def. Of relating to or derived from a living matter. Are we also going to argue the word "the"? Bleach isn't to used to "break" down the organics, when the filter sock overflows is a pretty good indication it is full and no longer serviceable. I use to rinse them with straight water and the would still stink. What is the stink coming from? Nitrates and phoshates? Organics ?

I'm glad I wasn't the only one that was in awe with the hair splitting of a word... "IMO" when on a casual forum and the intent is implied, don't belittle the dude, jeesh...

However, I've let my socks go a bit longer than I planned on, but the water flowing out the top is definitely the time I yank them. I put that in the "tip" section of my brain bank. haha!

 

[Pete polyp]

Hey.... guess what the food industry uses to remove organics (protein in specific) from equipment? Chlorine! I wonder why that is..... Maybe because chlorine is one of the most effective detergents known to man.

A product with an acidic nature will have very little effect on organic protein, because the low end of the Ph scale does not dissolve organic matter, caustic does. Acids are anything under 7ph, caustic is anything over 7ph. When I worked in the food industry we would use mostly chlorine to clean everything in the factory. To clean the insides of a machine or pipes we used a caustic which mixed at 12ph at a 1:100 ratio... 1 part caustic to 100 gallons if water @ 12ph. We would use nitric acid weekly to remove the scale left on the stainless (mostly lime)

So your argument about a solution that's caustic in nature (high Ph) not having effect on organic material is completely false.

 

[Chameleon]

Organic - def. Of relating to or derived from a living matter. Are we also going to argue the word "the"? Bleach isn't to used to "break" down the organics, when the filter sock overflows is a pretty good indication it is full and no longer serviceable. I use to rinse them with straight water and the would still stink. What is the stink coming from? Nitrates and phoshates? Organics ?

As for the definition of organic, organic is an adjective, organics is a noun referring to organic matter. The point was you cant kill organics and you can very well get rid of them without bleach. The smell you are attributing to organics stems from the fact that you haven't killed the living organisms and then they in turn start the process of decay on the organics still present, producing a variety of chemicals in the process which you can smell. If you kill these organisms with bleach they cant start the process of decay and hence no smell, but that has nothing to do with whether or not organics are there. Whether or not they are there is completely dependent on mechanical removal which bleach can aid in but can be done with just water as well.

 

[Chameleon]

Hey.... guess what the food industry uses to remove organics (protein in specific) from equipment? Chlorine! I wonder why that is..... Maybe because chlorine is one of the most effective detergents known to man.

A product with an acidic nature will have very little effect on organic protein, because the low end of the Ph scale does not dissolve organic matter, caustic does. Acids are anything under 7ph, caustic is anything over 7ph. When I worked in the food industry we would use mostly chlorine to clean everything in the factory. To clean the insides of a machine or pipes we used a caustic which mixed at 12ph at a 1:100 ratio... 1 part caustic to 100 gallons if water @ 12ph. We would use nitric acid weekly to remove the scale left on the stainless (mostly lime)

So your argument about a solution that's caustic in nature (high Ph) not having effect on organic material is completely false.

That is somewhat true. At the opposite end of the pH spectrum you will also help remove organics. In biochemistry labs we often use sodium hydroxide solutions to remove proteins and other organics. This is because such a solution is good at denaturing a protein and then preventing it from interacting with other proteins i.e. precipitation or aggregation and it will remain or go back into solution. This allows for removal by rinsing, but by no means destroys the integrity of the organic bonds. Higher pH solutions can destroy bonds however this is not what is being done in the food industry when they are cleaning, they are merely solubilizing proteins and protein aggregates for easy removal by water.

Acid hydrolysis, however, at low pH, will actually break covalent bonds leading to dissociation of the native organic molecule. Its destroying rather than solubilizing for washing away and this is why I used it as an example of how to 'kill' organics instead of washing them away.

 

[CastAway]

You know, if we all kept hamsters as opposed to reef tanks, the conversations would be boring as heck. Just saying...

I love this thread!

 

[ChristopherKriens]

I just take 10 minutes to rinse my socks out under hot water, work the particulates out, dry and replace. If the sock gets clean enough to let water pass through it's clean enough for its purpose. I don't care what color it is; it's a detritus filter not a prom dress.

 

[Chameleon]

You know, if we all kept hamsters as opposed to reef tanks, the conversations would be boring as heck. Just saying...

I love this thread!

then we would be having conversations on the mouse Utopian experiment by John B. Calhoun and behavioral sinks. Some interesting links:
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC1644264/pdf/procrsmed00338-0007.pdf
Behavioral sink - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

 

[kv69]

No socks for me. 4 inch pvc tube with eggcrate two thirds of the way down and a 3 inch hole cut at the bottom attached to a plexiglass 4x4 square. I use polyfill for pillows as a filter, a bag costs 4 bucks and has lasted me for over a year. Baseball sized portion every two days. no muss no fuss. the good stuff makes it back through to the system, nasty stuff stays in the polyfill. Happy happy.

 

[CastAway]

Well. This puts a whole new spin on The Secret of NIMH. Thanks for that. :neutral:

 

[Dowtish]

I have used them for almost 4 years straight on my SPS tank. I wash them in a front load washer on hot, no bleach. Never any issues.

These days I run a single 7" sock and leave it on until it overflows. Usually about 2 weeks. I dont turn off my return pump when I feed either.

I run bio pellets and my theory is to let the food/detritus build up to keep my n03 present in order for the pellets to keep consuming my p04. I do not run GFO and I barely run GAC, and if I do its passively in my dirty filter sock.:smile:

 

[Reef head]

No socks for me. 4 inch pvc tube with eggcrate two thirds of the way down and a 3 inch hole cut at the bottom attached to a plexiglass 4x4 square. I use polyfill for pillows as a filter, a bag costs 4 bucks and has lasted me for over a year. Baseball sized portion every two days. no muss no fuss. the good stuff makes it back through to the system, nasty stuff stays in the polyfill. Happy happy.

I did this too for a while until I noticed the pod population lived in it and I was continually removing them. If there is a way to save the pods and get rid of the junk, I would love that route.

 

[ChristopherKriens]

... I run bio pellets and my theory is to let the food/detritus build up to keep my n03 present in order for the pellets to keep consuming my p04. I do not run GFO and I barely run GAC, and if I do its passively in my dirty filter sock.:smile:

I run pellets too and I like this idea, but how does the filter sock contribute to a change in the ratio between no3 : po4? Wouldn't leaving food to break down in the sock contribute phosphates just the same?

 

[Diesel]

No socks for me. 4 inch pvc tube with eggcrate two thirds of the way down and a 3 inch hole cut at the bottom attached to a plexiglass 4x4 square. I use polyfill for pillows as a filter, a bag costs 4 bucks and has lasted me for over a year. Baseball sized portion every two days. no muss no fuss. the good stuff makes it back through to the system, nasty stuff stays in the polyfill. Happy happy.

Now we all want to see this, don't we??
Show us the mon........ I mean pics!!