Bio-balls VS Refugium??

Currently my sump is a proflex-2, and i am ashamed to admit i use bio-balls with the trickle tray, and i usually do daily tests b/c im about 6 month's into the hobby and i want to know how to better control what goes down, and recently my nitrates have been pretty high, were talking like 15 - 20 ppm now ive done everything went and bought a media reactor, bought an RODI unit thinking my old one was bad, and sure enough nothing changed, so here i am!! and i need some input on how to get this down!! i have no problem changing to a refugium, im actually considering this but i dont know where to start with it, any help would be very well appreciated! Thanks!

 

Refugium is superior IMO.

I would start with removing 1/4 of the bio-balls every 3-4 days, to allow the system time to adjust.

 

+1 to above, your live rock in the tank should be all of the bio filtration needed.

Post a pic of the sump and we will be able to give better suggestions on the conversion.

 

good point, sorry should have just done that right away, heres my sump, its a acrylic sump made by aqeon and its model pro-flex 2 with bio-ball media kit, here it is

 

fuge all the way...bio balls are nitrate factories

take out the bio balls, put about a 2" sand bed and some live rock rubble and some cheato and your set..and a little light...

 

ok now the main concern for me would be taking the bioballs out, ive cleaned them and stuff before, but like a quarter at a time, and they do get pretty nasty, should i stick with the advice above that i was given previously? the main concern is if i do that the water will splash the bioballs around ALOT and id have a spike of nitrates... maybe im just being to cautious but i dont want to risk that. my trates are high enough as they are... lol

 

i would take the bio balls out asap, then clean the area pretty good, and then add dry sand and a couple pieces of rock from your tank and then a big ball of cheato..

and you will get a good pod population..its natural fish food and they are awesome at cleaning the tank..

 

alright i will do that, now can i use any kid of sand or is there a certain kind, im running a pretty large return pump that will be sucking some of the water through the refugium, so im going to want something to make it stick pretty good, and ive been reading people using cat litter??? why would you use this? any idea's?, and as far as live rock goes, i have about 30 lbs of liverock in a bucket with a heater and powerhead, its been there for a little under a week, it was from a biocube i took down that i previously had, would that be ok?? and should i put something in the fuge like hermit crabs and stuff? sorry ive got a ton of questions lol

 

The bio-balls have nutrifying bacteria on them that is supporting your biological filter, removing all those bio-balls at one time may lower your water quality. Hence the reason to do 1/4 at a time. You may have something higher than a level of nitrates to worry about, but that is up to you ultimately.

 

your sand just needs to be aragonite sand, dry so that it doesnt cause a cycle, as long as you dont have hurricane katrina in your fuge than any sand you buy at the fish store will be fine as long as its not the fiji pink stuff that is like salt grain size, any medium cut sand is fine..since you will have a good bit of live rock in there it will be fine, also for the live rock as long as when you took the tank down you placed the live rock in the bucket with old tank water with heat and stuff it should be fine..maybe test the water that the rock is in to be safe, i would..and since you have a good bit of it i would use as much as i could still giving yourself enough room for cheato to grow and move around a little with the flow, the more rock the better your pod population and more places to hide and breed..

as long as the rock didnt sit out the water for any long period of time than it should be fine..i wouldnt ever put rock back in my tank that has set out for longer than 30 minutes, but im wierd about stuff..if it has set out then just set everything else up and add the live rock after it has cycled,,mainly you just want to get cheato in there as soon as you can so it can start soaking up the nitrates and phosphates..

its cool on the questions thats why the site is here..