Aquaripure Filter Review

[James.A]

Well here I go with little info for those who have seen the ads and wondered is it to good to be true . Being a country fella and rancher for many years I susceptible to trying new things to make life and the never ending list of things to do in a day little more tolerable.
Hence I now in middle of aquaripure filter test on a new 140 gal never cycled tank that I purposely overloaded with many community fish for test purposes before removing and adding nice round fish :) And I definitely over loaded the bio .. oh boy did I ..

Now this tank I put a very underpowered MarineLand canister filter that rated for 50 gal .. yup that what I said 50 gal . Only floss and carbon in this poor little fellow .. Yes before ya all jump me ordered couple aquaclear 110 for future use but remember this was test for the new Large size aquaripure filter . Only other additions are couple air stones and powerhead to move surface water.

Now after week you could not even measure the nitrites as they were totally instant wrong way off the high end .. Time for water changes and I kept it up trying to keep nitrites and then nitrates at a bearable level ... after about 4 weeks I was starting to get little frustrated as was seeing no change but was fully aware I had done everything nasty to this poor tank from the start and being kinda stubborn fella and just spent equivalent of a nice size return on a fattened steer I decided time for more research.

Humm now I after the research I realized why had parts still left over from new bbq but that another story :)

Yes is very important to follow all instructions precisely with this filter to get it to cycle proper .. That means feeding it regular when new .. ( Mine loves vodka ) .. adjusting the drip rate proper and do actual timed drip rate adjustment so easy to eye ball later .. Not hard to do and I usually just do the adjustment every couple days when I checking tank.

Now funny thing is when actually followed proper procedure with this filter in few more weeks I notice that water parameters had not changed from my last tests ..( and I do test everything ) .. so I decided even tho was still far from optimum would let it go another two days and check again .. to my surprise reading where the same .. now I did another water change and I check readings before and after as I kinda fussy person and my readings were quite respectable and well in tolerance for the community fish. Not perfect but they had seen much worse . Again tested over next few days and without water changes there was noticeable improvement .. wow I thought this thing might actually work .. removed carbon and floss and just put floss back in to make sure was not biological build up in canister filter and still readings kept dropping day to day .. has been two months I would say now and happy to report everything is zero ammonia and zero nitrite and if there is any nitrates as might be just a tinge ( I looking hard for it ) of nitrate color in test but is definitely below 0.5 ppm and has been that way for at least two weeks now without any water changes. I am like a very happy camper at moment .

Now I am going to now have to purchase a redox meter as Im very curious how long I can maintain proper redox without the water changes and curious about my ph stability but at moment everything and absolutely perfect .

I will mention I not over feed and do vacuum up as in basic maintenance but again I can not believe how this unit has finally responded .. Will be giving it another month of butting my nails over not changing water and testing testing testing like a nut case untill I know is staying perfect then hopefully will have my answers to redox levels and buffering , If all is still good will remove most of the tank fish and add some nice not to expensive round fish and see how they grow and feed and if issues.

So to sum up .. I love this aquaripure and hope continues to preform .. I not care if have to add water once a week for redox if I not have to do daily to keep fish happy and growing proper without being stunted .. but so far looking good .

I should mention you need a tall cabinet for the large aquripure and it not ugly so would look fine beside tank .. also get right size for tank and I guess should point out don't do like me and bbq ... follow instructions to letter and they not hard to follow :)

I will add further info after give it another month or so if anyone interested :)

[roundfishross]

when growing out small discus, it's not just the nitrates you are trying to remove through water changes but rather all types of dissolved organic compounds. also the point of large frequent water changes is to replenish exausted mineral content that the young fish will need to flourish.

[thebouncingparty]

Interested if this aquaripure is worth it. Most experts think it isn't and does .ot or is not a substitute for water changes.

[Foxfire]

The unit does what they claim (processes nitrates) but such units are not of any possible use to a discus keeper and here is why. Besides having absolutely terrible instructions these units can kill fish if any mistake is made since they provide water nearly fully depleted in oxygen - must have an airstone or HOB/water spray (which they do not tell anyone to use.) Also, the flow rate is a total joke. A unit for a 150 gal and higher tanks provides about 35 ml of clean water per minute or a tiny 15 gal a day. Will that keep nitrates to zero for a normal bio-load 150 gal tank? I don't think so and here is a comparison. Even for a poorly kept discus tank that just gets 50% water changes twice a week the tank would have a water exchange of 150 gal; the aquaripure would provide a mere 105 gal for the tank - and remember, this last number is a recycled exchange - not all pure water at once (no mixing) like a standard water change.
Worse, they claim in the instructions that the unit needs all other bio-filtration removed to work properly (phase all such units out.)
So all ammonia waste must be solely removed at this tiny rate - this really makes me wonder now all the ammonia gets processed for a standard bio-load 150 gal tank? Can't see how - I'd never risk that many discus to find out (the tank I am testing the aquaripure unit on still has a canister and algae scrubber to assist it - besides not wanting to risk the fish, I wanted to see how the unit works with normal bio-filtration. It appears to be producing pure water so I am completely confused why the company requires all other filters to be removed?
For me, the cure (nitrates) is not worth the risk unless one decides not to use a R/O system and has nitrates in their source water - hence no way to remove them. Under these conditions money could be saved compared to R/O replacement componets over a year and half - time frame before the aquaripure needs replacement - but still, the rate of water exchange seems suitable only for a community tank, not discus.
Also, as I posted in other threads here, these units can create sulfur compounds that can make an entire room smell due to the unit processing too much fish waste and losing all oxygen in its own incoming water (i.e. being the only bio-filtration system in the tank) - under these conditions its low oxygen tolerate nitrate processing bacteria shifts mode when there is almost no oxygen and creates sulfur based compounds (the bacteria must use other organics in the water for the sulfur source.)
One last point - the bacteria must be fed at least twice a week with pure alcohol (or a sugar solution) and this can be a pain or a possible disaster if forgotten/missed ... . Worse still, the flow valve tends to change flow rate down to zero and must be checked every day or again, a disaster can occur if this is your only bio-filter!

[jozwikjp]

I am currently cycling one of these on my oober fancy goldfish tank. You should be very careful to monitor the effluent water quality while cycling.
I haven't started removing existing biofilrtation from my canisters, I am probably 4-5 days in and I noticed some the fish were not acting right.

I tested the water and it was holy moly bad. I had to retest just to make sure I didn't screw up my drop counts. After scrambling to dose with prime and doing a large water change I tested the effluent and the nitrite was 5PPM, possibly higher as I have never seen it that dark purple before.

I am dripping the unit into 5-gallon buckets now until this thing cycles. I talked to the owner and he said this is normal as some of the bacteria converts nitrate to nitrite and other bacteria converts nitrite to nitrogen gas.

I will try to keep some comprehensive notes on this and follow up. He said that it would not hurt the fish but I am assuming that he meant as long as you have enough tank dillution to make the nitrite not as toxic, but my tank spike was kinda high, even ammonia was high, it was a a bit freaky.

[Dogbert4Pres]

I just completed a DIY one that is a 45g chamber and flowing 5gph right now. Aquaripure did not have one big enough for my main system, but the operation is the same as my DIY one.

With regards to someone saying they make you turn off all other filtration, I would venture to say that the Aquaripure company wants as much nh3 and no2 to go into the filter as possible so that it is oxydized and the water further down the filter is oxygen depleted. Should they mention this in the documentation... yes, but I have not seen any documentation either. I can say without having an aquaripure that it will work with bio filtration, mine does with input O2 at near saturation and no measurable NH3 or NO2. I can understand Aquaripure being cautious since how many people actually measure this, but feel that someone taking the time to research and buy this should be competent enough to operate it. The system also needs tuned to both flow and amount of vodka supplied, both of which are somewhat independent variables. The vodka amount is tied to the amount of nitrate going into the system as measured in mg which is indirectly tied to the retention time the water stays in the unit.

With respect to the depletion of dissolved O2 in the tank, I think in the Aquaripure youtube videos they do have the output pointed in the direction of water flow and I think John mentions this as well.

Since my denitrator uses filtered water, I am not sure I will have a sulphur concern or if that is even a concern when the water is forced through the denitrator under pressure ie not a RSB filter. It was my understanding this could happen in anaerobic conditions but only if the water became stagnant in places with unoxydized organics.

My system is just a proof of concept to make sure it works and that I can have a baseline for building something for my whole fish room, 2000g now but 3000g by summer. My well water is >100mg/l nitrate and even after RO is at 10mg/l. One could say just change out 100% of the water everyday and all is well... except for the fact that the well is at ~55 degrees and my fish would require parkas. I do need to make a solar preheater for the RO but that is another story. My DIY chamber is one of those large salt containers used as a water softener with the media just under the water line as set by the built-in overflow which I will use to return water to the 275 LSB filter in the floor. I seeded the system with bacteria from a digestor at a local wastewater plant. Digestors are what are used to convert the high levels of nitrate to under 1 mg/l before releasing. On day 2 of being seeded, there was a noticable decrease in nitrate and by day 4, I was getting 5 mg/l out of my main system that is ~60 mg/l. I am going to play with this DIY project to get a good understanding of retention time v. nitrate v. height of media v. vodka before building a 200g system. From what I have gleaning searching on anaerobic filter design, retention time should be from 6 - 8 hours which sets your flowrate.

I do not think it should be marketed as a replacement for water changes, rather something to assist in nitrate removal for those systems that would otherwise still have issues. Will our fish be better with lower nitrates between our water changes, sure. Will they be better with less frequent changes but low nitrates, probably not. For me, I have struggled growing out as many fry as I have since the food requirements are enormous and when I ran my RO at 1000gpd, I had pumped the well dry after a month, DOH! There are also huge energy savings from not having to heat 1000g of 55 degree water to 83 degrees.