so you just bought yourself a brand new filter congratulations probably
one of these or something similar and you have no idea where these ceramic rings go
not to worry not only am i going to tell you where they go in each one of these filters
and their equivalent counterparts i'm also going to show you let's go
welcome back to the channel everybody if it's your first time here my name is kev from caveman
aquatics.com and on this channel i like to make helpful videos on all topics of the aquarium hobby
that gets straight to the point so if you like the sound of that consider subscribing and you won't
miss any new content so before we start let me just say i know you're probably looking for your
specific type of filter instructions i will have time stamps in the description below with each
type of filter so you can jump straight to the one you want but before you do that i do implore
you to watch the whole video because you might be starting off with a nice little hob and one
day you might upgrade to a canister like this and then eventually a bigger canister like this so you
might as well get all the information right now just my opinion so the two big canisters the 407
and the fx6 i actually pulled out from underneath my tank to do this video but i didn't have an hob
so i went ahead and bought a fluval aqua clear 70 to show you guys exactly how to do it so
before we start talking about where your ceramic rings go you need to understand that the reason
why they go where they go is because of the direction of water in your filter and each one
of these are different that's why i'm covering them separately in the aquaclear it's designed
for water to go from the bottom to the top so the direction of media in any filter is always going
to be the same it always goes mechanical first and then biological and finally chemical if you choose
to use it now granted there are some exceptions to that rule which we are going to get into later on
in the video so don't miss it but for right now that's the rule mechanical bio then chemical so
in the aqua clear because it goes from the bottom to the top our first thing that we're going to put
in the bottom is our sponge mind you in the aqua clear you can actually take out this media basket
so the first thing at the bottom of the basket is going to be your sponge that's
your mechanical filtration on the bottom now if you bought this filter brand new and you look at
the box it actually does show you a picture of which way they want you to stack this i'm going
to tell you not to do it in that order because it actually has your chemical media next i'm
going to suggest that you put your bio media your ceramic rings right on top of your sponge that
goes next obviously not in this plastic bag guys your aqua clear comes with a mesh nylon bag you
want to put your ceramic rings inside the nylon bag and then they go right on top of the sponge
i'm not doing it guys because i'm not installing this hob this isn't going to go on any tank so i'm
keeping it inside the back but this is where your ceramic rings will go right on top of your sponge
then on top of your bio media is where you would put your chemical media in this case it comes with
a nice bag of activated carbon your activated carbon will go right on top as so again not
in this plastic bag but you do want to leave it inside the mesh bag that's inside the plastic bag
so just open up the plastic bag and throw in the carbon with the mesh bag inside your filter that's
pretty much it for the aqua clear it's very simple as to where the ceramic media goes it always goes
mechanical then biomedia and finally chemical on top if you choose to use it a very similar hob to
the aqua clear is the title from seachem the title also has water traveling in the same direction
from the bottom to the top so you would do the exact same thing sponge on the bottom biomedia in
the center chemical media on top of your title as well now for the penguin users the penguin hob is
a little bit different those come with cartridges and water actually flows from the back of the hob
to the front so keeping in mind the order of media based on the direction of water flow you would
want to have your sponge in the back then your bio media and finally chemical media in front if you
can fit all that normally those cartridges that come with that filter take up all the space but
if you want better options for your penguin hob i have a great video on exactly how to set that up
i'll put a link up here and in the description below next up guys we have our fluval 407
and the equivalent filter to the o7 series obviously is all the 07's the 107 the 207 the
307 and the 407 are all built exactly the same the only difference is the 407 has four trays
the 307 has three and so on now the reason why we need to talk about this separately is because the
direction of water in a canister is different from the direction of water in hob in the 407
in any 07 fluval canister water is going to travel down one side through your coarse and medium
sponges and then it's going to shoot across the bottom and then go back up through the trays and
out to your tank so in this case the first tray that water hits is going to be your bottom tray
so let's work from bottom to top your bottom tray is going to consist of your black core sponge
this is mechanical media then you can put a white fine filter pad right on top of there that also
comes with your 407 your second tray in my opinion i like to use polyfill as you can see it's still
wet i tried to dry it up but it's still wet i like to use polyfill in my second tray this is
fine mechanical media that's going to grab all the tiny little particles in your water and
give you crystal clear water you don't have to use polyfill here if you don't want to you can
add biomedia right to the second tray but because this is the 407 and it comes with
four trays i feel like using this second tray for a complete uh polishing material in here is gonna
make your tank look great in the third tray from the bottom guess what we got guys ceramic rings
here's where our ceramic rings will begin this is the first step of your bio media i like to
put this right on the third tray right after my mechanical media so we got coarse mechanical
media and then fine mechanical media and then finally your ceramic rings go in the dirt tray
now for the fourth tray again this is optional you can choose to put chemical media inside your
fourth tray if you choose to use it or you can add more bio media a while back i chose to use these
bio bowls in my top tray and since these bio bowls are already seeded with beneficial bacteria i'm
not going to change them out so the choice is add more ceramic rings to your top tray or you can add
chemical media into your top tray and that's where your ceramic rings will go in a canister filter
like the o7 series now here's a tip with this guys if you decide to use chemical meat in your top
tray and you decide to use something like purigen the bag of puritan is so thin that if you put a
bag of purigen by itself in this tray there's going to be a lot of leftover space what happens
when you leave all that extra space in the tray is that water is going to go around your purigen
and not through it which defeats the purpose so a little trick that i like to use is i wrap my
purigen in polyfill and then put it in the tray that way instead of just going around the purigen
now the water has to go through the polyfill and through the purigen in order to get back out
now other equivalent canisters of this size will be pretty similar to where your ceramic rings go
these kind of filters usually have water shoot down to the bottom and then work its way up so
as long as water is traveling up your canister filter you always want your mechanical filtration
on the bottom and then your ceramic rings on top and finally chemical media if you choose to use it
for those of you that can't keep your eyes off these beautiful fish and wish you could learn
more about them well you're in luck because i have a free webinar training with the top
three secrets about keeping african cichlids make sure to check it out up here or in the
description below now let's move on to the big boys and i can tell you right now guys
that you may not have an fx6 right now you may even think you'll never need an fx6
well in this hobby it's very very common to upgrade tanks upgrade filters so never say
never it's better that you get this information now so if one day you do decide to upgrade to
the fx6 you know exactly what's going on now the fx6 is a whole different animal this filter they
decided to redesign the whole thing which makes everything different and if you just don't know
about fx6s you're going to fill it up the wrong way just like with the other filters i'm going to
first tell you about how water travels through the filter because we need to understand that
in order to know where our ceramic rings go in the fluval fx6 water enters the canister and shoots
down a tube all the way straight to the bottom from the bottom of the canister water travels
up the sides of these trays through these core sponges see these core sponges here
each tray has these big core sponges in it as water is traveling up the size through these
core sponges it's getting mechanically filtered then once it reaches the top it overflows into the
middle and goes down the center so when you think about each tray that you're going to add media to
water is traveling from the top tray down the center once water hits the bottom center of
the canister it's then shot back out to your tank so why am i telling you all that because
you need to mechanically filter your water from the top of this canister down unlike the other
ones where it was from the bottom up so your top tray of the fx6 is going to have more mechanical
filtration i like to have a blue medium sponge on top followed by a white filter floss pad now
before we move on i did say there were some exceptions to the rule of the order of media which
is mechanical bio and then chemical in the fx6 the way the fx6 is designed is designed to not have
to go into it and clean it every so often meaning that the fx's can go four five or even six months
without needing a cleaning but if you've got chemical media in it or fine filter pads like this
these cannot go six months without being changed these and your chemical media need to be changed
probably monthly with that being the case you don't want to have to open up your canister
every single month just to get to the chemical media and the fine pads and disturb all the
bacteria that's in there just to change out a piece of chemical media so through the help of my
facebook group and some great knowledgeable guys that we got over there i decided to change the way
i set up my fx6 and it's been working great so far so the order of media that i choose in the
fx6 goes mechanical first through the outside sponges and then chemical media followed by
the bio media on the bottom reason for this is if your chemical media is on the top tray in the top
tray every month all you got to do is pop the top off of your fx6 reach into the top tray pull out
your chemical media put in a new one put in a new fine filter pad and pop the top back on and you're
done no need to take all three of these trays out water dripping all over the place making a
mess of everything to get to the chemical media in your bottom tray no put it in your top tray
very easily accessible you'll thank me later one more tip about the top tray in your fx6
if you're only using purigen in your fx6 like i am currently check it out look at how much space
is around that bag of puritan now water is not going to choose to go through the bag of purigen
water is going to choose to go around it it's going to choose the path of least resistance
gonna do it every time so that makes your purigen worthless now unlike these other filters where
we use polyfill i feel that the fx6 is too powerful and can actually push the polyfill
through your canister and back out to your tank which is why i use these filter pads instead
so a nice trick that i use for this pure gym bag is i sandwich it inside the filter frost
see i put it as a sandwich inside the filter pads in between i put those in the bottom there
and then my medium blue pad on top the reason why i do that again just like in the 407 is to force
water through the bag of purigen if it's got to go through those fine filter pads it's going to also
find its way through the purigen which is the path of least resistance enough about the top
tray where do the ceramic rings go they go in your next tray your second tray middle tray now the fx6
does have a red basket that goes in here as well that's just to separate media if you're going to
use two different types of media but if you're going to use all ceramic rings which is fine
here's where you throw your whole bag of ceramic rings fill this whole sucker up with as much
ceramic rings as you can and that's where they go now bottom tray what goes in here since we already
put our chemical media on the top tray guess what more ceramic rings or maybe some matrix or maybe
some bio home ultimate whatever type of media that you choose to use whatever media you have on hand
add some more in here if you got space in these trays for bio media fill it up with bio media
in my case most of you know that i don't use any of these bio meters anymore i've got a
great video on the actual biometer that i use especially in my fx6s it's called pot scrubbers
if you don't know what that is go check that video out right there i'll have a link in the
description below and you might ask where are they right now let me show you check them out
guys since i'm using my fx6 that i had installed on my tank i had to take the pop scrubbies out to
show you guys where your ceramic rings will go so i decided to keep them in here temporarily
in my grow-out tank just to preserve all that beneficial bacteria that's in those pot scrubbies
again if you're like pot scrubbies go check that video out you'll enjoy it
i hope you guys found that helpful if you did make sure to hit that like button and don't
forget to subscribe because next week's video is going to be a banger see ya in the next one you