Bio Pellets - Good Idea or Not?
 

I'm considering using Bio Pellets via a Phosban Reactor to help with filtration, anyone currently using them? Any good or bad experiences? Any good tips?

All your thoughts and opinions will help me make my decision.

Thanks in advance!

I use biopellets in a two little fish 150 phosban reactor with a mj1200 pump, works great. Ideally I think you'd want the vertex reactor that probably has a little more flow.

Vertex pellets and a NextReef MR1 run with an AquaMedic 2500 here and work like a charm. Just make sure your system is mature enough, as meny people try to add them to a new system and it turns ugly for them. Start with a 1/4 of the recommended amount and add more monthly until you reach the target amount. Just my 2 cents and how I did it.

Bio Pellets don't really help with "Filtration" of the water per-se.

It's all a biological process to reduce N/P in the water. And results are not immediate and take a while to notice.

P.S. I have run mine in a modded Phosban 150 Reactor. Put a MJ-1200 on there for flow, replace the top foam with some "hobby mesh" (from Michaels) to contain the pellets from escaping, and completely remove the bottom Red plastic piece to get maximum tumbling.

The thing to remember with bio pellets is the tumbling, not to fast not to slow check some you tube video's. People that seem to have problems with them are usually tumbling them to fast or to slow.

Bio-pellets I quit you!
http://www.canreef.com/vbulletin/showthread.php?t=75222

+1 !
I scrapped mine for good ! Did not work at all.

Yup, I had nothing but bad luck with pellets.

My tank still hasn't recovered, but is far better than it was. Natural nitrate and phosphate reduction methods are basically fail safe, cheap, easy to set up.

When I move next year I plan on expanding my fuge to a larger size.

I am using biopellets for the second time. I found the break in period a challenge, diatoms were the biggest pain. Once I hit the two to three month mark everything had adjusted and now I can feed as heavily as I like without an increase in nutrients. Since their introduction, tons of people are using them with an excellent success rate. A refugium is a good means of nutrient export. I have both scenarios set up currently, my FOWLR is using a fuge and working well, my SPS tan is set up with biopellets and personally I feel the pellets are doing a better job than a fuge ever did for that particular tank. If I were you I would get a better reactor than a TLF, Vertex and Next Reef both make far better reactors (and if you like spending money Deltec makes a nice one which is no better than the two previous mentioned brands, only twice the price). Here are a few pointers for you based on my experience:

1. Introduce the pellets slowly so you don't cause a Cyano or Diatom outbreak. Initially, the tank has to adjust and bacteria needs to colonize, the slower this happens, the better your chance of success.
2. Make sure there is enough flow to keep the pellets tumbling gently, your reactor doesn't have to look like a snow globe.
3. Manufacturers recomment not using GFO or other Phosphate removing media, I have had better results using GFO in conjunction with pellets.
4. Keep the outlet of the reactor as close to the intake of the skimmer as you can. Skimming is how the nutrients are exported so the less reactor water that travels back into the tank the better.
5. Use a very powerful skimmer, most recommend buying a skimmer rated larger than your tank, this is especially true with biopellets.
Top up the pellets the same way you firs introduced them, very slowly.

There's no disputing the pellets do work, it's just a matter of setting it up properly and like everything in this hobby... be patient. Results won't be noticeable over night.

Well i did have a reactor better then TLF, this one, it is huge and i had all pellets turning very aggressively but not too much.
I did notice a better SPS polyp extension however later with time tank got worse and i was forced to scrap the pallets and i am glad i did.