Eheim owners... help!!

[swampy1972]

Hi all,

I've recently aquired an Eheim Pro3 2080. It's a big beast so takes a lot of media! I'm trying to do the cost comparison between buying the Eheim media pack and buying other media such as matrix.

Question: How many litres of media does each tray hold?

I need to get an accurate idea to work out the cost. Unfortunately the manual is no help. I've sent an email to Eheim Aust but prob' won't get an answer till next week.

Thanks guys

Swampy ;)

[ILLUSN]

3.85L per basket, the cheepest way is to go to a hydroponics shop and buy a bag of HYDROTON balls, 50L will cost you $35-$45 every year replace 1 tray, the expanded clay has a usable surface area ~ seachem pond matrix.

the next cheapest way would be to buy matrix in bulk (20L~$300) take out the 12 you need and sell off the rest.

the next cheepest is to buy the media pack. advantage of options 2 and 3 are the media never needs replacing. but to be honest all my sumps run 2/3's hydroton to 1/3 pond matrix and i cant rate the stuff high enough.

i suppose you could always take optin 4 and sell me the filter :) LOVE the 2080's

[swampy1972]

Thanks ILLUSN. Great info as always.

I was thinking about going for a combo such as, Glass noodles in the lower basket, clay in the middle and Matrix in the top tray followed obviously by the two grades of foam pad. How does that sound?

I'm pretty sure I'll buy the genuine Eheim foam pad set unless someone has a better alternative. I've heard the course blue foam they use is extremely good quality and it might be good to see what they use for their white foam - from there I can assess a suitable alternative if needed.

Last option - giving it to you... don't like your chances, but nice try ;)

Swampy

[ILLUSN]

Lol just putting it out there you never know till you ask :) the blue pad is a must buy it does all your prefiltration for you and makes this filter unbelivably good IMO mech based media such as noodles is a bit of a waste in this filter the blue pad catches so much gunk that nothing big makes it onto the filter you'll get better bio filtration just filling the whole thing up with biomedia. If you were to use a combo of clay and matrix do as you said and put the matrix in the top basket it will stay cleaner for longer if your going to use matrix buy some siporax mini as well as matrix doesn't pack down well. The siporax will fill the gaps inbetween

[swampy1972]

Sound good ILLUSN. That was the plan re: position of the media.

Do you know of any online retailers or LFS that stock the siporax mini? I can find the normal siporax but it's just noodles..

Last stupid question for now.. What's the reason you use Pond Matrix over normal Matrix? Is there a significant size difference between the 2, the only info I can find says Matrix is approx 10mm, but no data for Pond Matrix.. ??

[ILLUSN]

pond matrix is bigger, in my sumps i use egg crate to suspend the media, normal matrix has small bits that can fall through, the baskets in the 2080 are fine for "normal" matrix its exactly the same, just the bigger size means it packs more loosly, not so great in pro series eheim with baskets but fine for a classic or in a sump (all up i'm using close to 200L of it in my sumps) also being a bit bigger its easier to wash and handel.

you'll have to hunt online for siporax mini, its tiny tablet shaped media that fills gaps in matrix nicely, on a 2028 i sold Matzilla i managed to fit 400ml of it in with a basket full of regular matrix. if you use hydroton you wont have this problem the sperical shape makes it pack together really nicely, just like ehim substrate pro, from memory its usable surface are is 140 square meters/L which is just as good as "normal" matrix for all real reasons.

[swampy1972]

Cheers. I appreciate the help. ;)