I recently purchased 5 Hot Mag 250’s, one for each tank for use as an augmenting filter for each tanks main filter which are either the FX5 or a pair of Mag 350’s. Each Hot Mag was going to be used either for polishing or carbon for the purpose of being able to quickly change out media since the How Mag 250 is a light portable HOB canister. So much for history.
One of the weaknesses of the Hot Mag is that it is so small yet powerful in GPH that it is hard to come up with a media configuration that has both excellent dirt catching ability and endurance without clogging the media to a trickle with dirt too early. Sometimes requiring media cleaning as early a 1 week and usually no more then 3 weeks before the clogged media has slowed GPH to a trickle. This which brings me to the subject and purpose of this thread.
Over the past 3 months I have been trying out many media configurations involving different applications of the stock media, sponges, Poly fill, Poly batten, carbon, screens, Bio fiber, rings, Bio balls, exc, exc. Each time the results were either great dirt filter accumulation with short endurance before cleaning was required, or fair dirt accumulation with long endurance before cleaning was required, but never both. That is not until this evening!
This evening as I was in the process of changing out the last Hot Mag 250 from a custom media configuration I was trying to the Micron Cartridge I truly did not expect to find much dirt because The filter had been running now for more then a month with no diminished flow. But what I found completely surprised me.
The Photo's below shows a picture taken after I had already cleaned the stock blue outer Hot Mag sponge and the custom inner strainer sock I had made with cut and sewn blue/white bonded bio pad. So the photo only does it partial justice. The evidence in the pail of once clean water and the still filthy Poly wool that was packed inside the media basket removed and laying in the tub. Previously whenever the Poly wool became inundated with black mud like dirt it always would clog the inner strainer and diminish flow by 80%, however by creating the blue/white bonded sock around the inner strainer it acted like a porous strainer and buffer that did not allow the mud filled Poly to clog the plastic strainer holes. So even though dirt continued to pile up more and more inside the filter media, most of the water flow remained unrestricted which IMO is really the breakthrough I was looking for.
So here is how it was configured. First cut a tube size portion of blue/white bonded bio pad and sew it into a tube shape for the “large hole strainer”. Then assemble the media basket as normal.
Then as seen below lightly pack the media basket from the top opening with Poly wool using a chopstick to position each clump of wool working from the bottom all the way around the blue/white bonded pad covering the strainer. Do not pack the wool tightly like stuffing a pillow, but rather completely yet airy without compressing.
Now below note the three layers of filter media starting from the inside out with the "large hole strainer", then the blue/white bonded sock protecting the “large hole strainer” from clogging, followed by the Poly fill lightly packed, followed by the outermost blue sponge sock.
Try this configuration with your small Hot Mag and I promise you will not only be very impressed by how well it filters out dirt (as always) but the incredible amount of endurance the filter will last between cleanings now the polishing Poly fill cannot matt against the strainer holes directly due to the offset provided by the blue/white bonded bio pad sock, which can be rinsed and reused many times, the Poly fill tossed out and replaced of course.
One of the weaknesses of the Hot Mag is that it is so small yet powerful in GPH that it is hard to come up with a media configuration that has both excellent dirt catching ability and endurance without clogging the media to a trickle with dirt too early. Sometimes requiring media cleaning as early a 1 week and usually no more then 3 weeks before the clogged media has slowed GPH to a trickle. This which brings me to the subject and purpose of this thread.
Over the past 3 months I have been trying out many media configurations involving different applications of the stock media, sponges, Poly fill, Poly batten, carbon, screens, Bio fiber, rings, Bio balls, exc, exc. Each time the results were either great dirt filter accumulation with short endurance before cleaning was required, or fair dirt accumulation with long endurance before cleaning was required, but never both. That is not until this evening!
This evening as I was in the process of changing out the last Hot Mag 250 from a custom media configuration I was trying to the Micron Cartridge I truly did not expect to find much dirt because The filter had been running now for more then a month with no diminished flow. But what I found completely surprised me.
The Photo's below shows a picture taken after I had already cleaned the stock blue outer Hot Mag sponge and the custom inner strainer sock I had made with cut and sewn blue/white bonded bio pad. So the photo only does it partial justice. The evidence in the pail of once clean water and the still filthy Poly wool that was packed inside the media basket removed and laying in the tub. Previously whenever the Poly wool became inundated with black mud like dirt it always would clog the inner strainer and diminish flow by 80%, however by creating the blue/white bonded sock around the inner strainer it acted like a porous strainer and buffer that did not allow the mud filled Poly to clog the plastic strainer holes. So even though dirt continued to pile up more and more inside the filter media, most of the water flow remained unrestricted which IMO is really the breakthrough I was looking for.
So here is how it was configured. First cut a tube size portion of blue/white bonded bio pad and sew it into a tube shape for the “large hole strainer”. Then assemble the media basket as normal.
Then as seen below lightly pack the media basket from the top opening with Poly wool using a chopstick to position each clump of wool working from the bottom all the way around the blue/white bonded pad covering the strainer. Do not pack the wool tightly like stuffing a pillow, but rather completely yet airy without compressing.
Now below note the three layers of filter media starting from the inside out with the "large hole strainer", then the blue/white bonded sock protecting the “large hole strainer” from clogging, followed by the Poly fill lightly packed, followed by the outermost blue sponge sock.
Try this configuration with your small Hot Mag and I promise you will not only be very impressed by how well it filters out dirt (as always) but the incredible amount of endurance the filter will last between cleanings now the polishing Poly fill cannot matt against the strainer holes directly due to the offset provided by the blue/white bonded bio pad sock, which can be rinsed and reused many times, the Poly fill tossed out and replaced of course.
