I was reading on undergarvel filters and just had an idea if you took a really long thing of filter media and glued it too the undergravel filter and put some gravel over it could it be like a mechanicle filter. then when you gravel vacumed all you would have to do would vacum the filter floss and you would have done the equivolint of rinsin out the filter floss in a power filter.

This has probably been tried before. It is an EXCELLENT idea but has a couple of drawbacks:


The floss would be picked and pulled so much (by the goldfish) that it would fray and you would get loose strands of the floss floating around.

If you were to put gravel over the floss, it would compress and not allow for maximum waterflow. It would also clog up very easily as a result of the compression.


There are actually UG filters that emply and dirt trap (sponge) in the uptubes. They are mainly run with a powerhead so that stuff settling under the plate gets pulled up into the tube and trapped on the sponge. Then the water goes into the poerhead and pumped back across the surface.


Hope this helps!

thanks