# Flourite black vs Flourite black sand



## 20 20

Yes, yet another 'which substrate do I use' thread from a planted newbie.:tongue: I've narrowed my choices for substrate for the 75 gallon I'm setting up to either Flourite black, or Flourite black sand. (That is, until I change my mind yet again...:eek5: ). Since I would need to order either on-line, I'd like to get as much info as I can on both of them. So, if anyone has any opinions on the following aspects of the two, I'd like to hear them:

A) Looks

B) Ease of setup - how much rinsing, do I need laterite, peat, or anything else under it, etc

C) Ease of maintenance - once set up, how easy is it to rescape without clouding the water, pull up plants, it's ability to hold plants in place, etc

D) Plant health - is either one 'better' for the plants health?

Any opinions on those, or any other aspects, would be greatly appreciated!


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## GreenThumbing

Both would be fine as far as im concerned, I used Eco Complete in my 75 gallon, and have had great success, I removed my flourite after a few months of slow growth. I went with eco complete because there was no rinsing required, and it comes packed wet. Some people have complained about large chucnks in their eco, yet I bought 6 bags for my 75 and all were perfectly fine, no chunks. You can get it at www.drfostersmith.com they do not charge additional shipping for heavy items such as substrates, and the price was right. They also carry the flourite if you decide to go with that. Good luck


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## 20 20

How deep is the eco-complete in your 75 gallons? Using the subtrate calculator on this site it says I need 8 bags to get a 3" deep layer.


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## GreenThumbing

Mine is about 2" deep, and I have had no problems keeping the plants rooted.


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## bigtanklvr

I have flourite red, 3" depth and with proper tank care my plants grow like weeds.


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## Ozymandias

Growth probably isn't an issue as long as you dose firtz (it my understanding that the substrate absorbs the nutrients I think). It Flourite so you are going to need some heavy rinsing for the plain black, I'm not sure how the sand would do with rinsing. people have done just plain Flourite with nothing else under it so I would think it's not necessary though peat probably would not hurt. i think it really come's down to is what you like better. personal i've never seen the sand but would really like to try it. you could also mix the two together.


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## Craigthor

I'm interested in mixing both the black adn black sand, depending on cost in my 75.

Craig


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## JSCOOK

100% Black Flourite, 3" deep, 90Gallon

Plants grow like crazy


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## 20 20

Best cost I can find is at Big Al's, 15.99 a bag for either the black, or the black sand. With $40.77 shipping to my place, 6 bags would cost me $136.68. I haven't been able to find it in any local fish stores, even That Fish Place.


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## Craigthor

is 6 enough for a 75? I would probably order 7-8 as I like to build hills and scapes with it.

Craig.


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## 20 20

I used this calculator to come up with the 6 bag amount for a 75 gallon, 3 inches deep:

http://www.plantedtank.net/substratecalculator.html

It comes up with 90 lbs needed. At 15 lbs a bag, that's 6 bags.


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## RedMarlboro

Craigthor said:


> is 6 enough for a 75? I would probably order 7-8 as I like to build hills and scapes with it.
> 
> Craig.


Yes, it will be plenty. I used 5 bags of Flourite Black on my 72 Gallon Bow. 7-8 is more than enough I would probably just order 7.


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## RedMarlboro

20 20 said:


> I used this calculator to come up with the 6 bag amount for a 75 gallon, 3 inches deep:
> 
> http://www.plantedtank.net/substratecalculator.html
> 
> It comes up with 90 lbs needed. At 15 lbs a bag, that's 6 bags.


Yes, that is probably more than enough, I could get by with 5 bags at 3 inches deep. The easiest way to know how much is to first place one bag in a corner. You can probably visualize the amount of bags you need aterwards. Good luck with your 75 gallon.


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## GreenThumbing

try www.drfostersmith.com they do not charge extra for bulk items to be shipped I bought 8 bags of Eco Complete and it only cost me 15.99 to ship them.


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## lauraleellbp

GreenThumbing said:


> try www.drfostersmith.com they do not charge extra for bulk items to be shipped I bought 8 bags of Eco Complete and it only cost me 15.99 to ship them.


This must be a new change. When I priced out $60 worth of Eco a few months back, shipping was like another $35 on top of that!


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## GreenThumbing

lauraleellbp said:


> This must be a new change. When I priced out $60 worth of Eco a few months back, shipping was like another $35 on top of that!


 
Not sure as I never bought anything oversized from them until then, but I also bought a new stand, and was only charged the regular shipping charge for that as well, and it was 40+ pounds. :biggrin:


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## lauraleellbp

I *just* bought my stand for my 90gal from them just over a week ago and DID have to pay extra! hmmmm


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## 20 20

Dr's F&S doesn't have Flourite black, but they do have eco-complete. Based on the substrate calculator, I'd need 7 bags of eco. At Dr's F&S that would be $153.93 with $13.99 shipping for a total of $167.92. Flourite black at Big Al's (6 bags) is $95.94 with $40.74 shipping for a total of $136.68. That's $30 less than the eco-complete to my door. So, I just ordered the Flourite black from Big Al's. Decided not to go with the sand because, well, just because. :tongue:


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## CobraGuppy

How long does Flourite black last before it loses all its nutrients?

I am going to order two bags of it soon for my 20 gallon planted tank from big als too


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## Ozymandias

Flourite as i understand it does not have much nutrients persay; I believe it does have extra iron in it though. But it is vary porous so absorbs stuff that is in the water column so if you dose firtz those firz of absorbed in to the Flourite. at least that how i understand


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## 20 20

Dang, I ordered it Sunday, and it's going to be here tomorrow. 3 day shipping!


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## Ozymandias

It's still good subrate though and actually i think there's more to it than what i described but I'm no expert on it. also really eco-complete has been looking bad recently so you not missing much.


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## lauraleellbp

*Concentration of nutrients in Flourite™*Aluminum​10210​Barium​124​Calcium​195​Cobalt​6​Chromium​13​copper​17​Iron​18500​Potassium​2195​Magnesium​2281​Manganese​64​Sodium​223​Nickel​12​Vanadium​15​Zinc​29​


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## Ozymandias

yup new i was missing some thing, thanks for the correction Lauraleellbp

made a fool of myself there:icon_redf


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## CobraGuppy

no you didnt xD at least you tried.

Thanks for the list o.o Its very helpful actually.
I wonder if there is a list like that for eco complete so we can compare :O


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## lauraleellbp

No you didn't Ozy, there's no guarantee that all those nutrients are bioavailable, as Tom Barr recently pointed out in a diff thread.

Here's the CaribSea link for Eco- not much info there though http://www.caribsea.com/pages/products/planted_aquar.html


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## Ozymandias

Thanks you guy.


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## Riddler

I just cleaned and put two bags of Flourite black into my 20G. Stuff is messy when it's being cleaned.

If you wanna see it I have pictures in the photo album section.

Riddler


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## sdy284

well i just purchased 1 bag of Flourite Black Sand from Bigals for my newly acquired 10g

once it gets here, I'll snap a few shots of it


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## 20 20

Doh. Shipment arrived from Big Al's yesterday. I look at it closely this morning. Sand. I ordered the black sand instead of the Flourite Black that I thought I was ordering. Fate, maybe? :tongue:


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## Ozymandias

Post some pic of it


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## 20 20

When I get it in the tank I'll take some pictures. I just got done rinsing it, and yes, it does need to be rinsed. Nice black color, but I'm not sure if 6 bags will be enough to get me 3 inches in my 75 gallon.


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## lauraleellbp

I doubt that too- maybe 2" with 6 bags?

I personally calculated 6 bags of fluorite + 35lbs of black gravel + 50lbs of black Colorquartz = 3-4" in my 90gal...


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## Homer_Simpson

CobraGuppy said:


> no you didnt xD at least you tried.
> 
> Thanks for the list o.o Its very helpful actually.
> I wonder if there is a list like that for eco complete so we can compare :O


Yes, there is. This was posted by Newt at Aquaticplantcentral.com a while ago. Go to:
http://www.aquaticplantcentral.com/...c-substrates/26813-eco-complete-question.html

Scroll down to the 7th post by Newt with the spreadsheet attachment. That speadsheet attachment gives you a comparison of the nutrient profile of Fluorite vs Eco-Complete.


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## 20 20

lauraleellbp said:


> I doubt that too- maybe 2" with 6 bags?
> 
> I personally calculated 6 bags of fluorite + 35lbs of black gravel + 50lbs of black Colorquartz = 3-4" in my 90gal...


I used the substrate calculator on this site:

http://www.plantedtank.net/substratecalculator.html

A 48" by 18" tank should need 6 bags of flourite to be 3" deep (90 lbs at 15 lbs/bag). Maybe I should have done the calculation using 'silica sand', which works out to 10 bags (150 lbs at 15 lbs/bag). Once I get it in the tank I'll measure how deep it is and report back.


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## Reepicheep

I put in Flourite Black Sand in the standard 55 gallon today -- 48" x 13". Filled it to a depth of about 3" using 5.5 bags. It looks great (pictures later), but boy is it messy! Washing the stuff took hours.


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## 20 20

Put the 6 bags of flourite black sand in the 75 gallon, makes about 2 inches. So, off I go to order 3 more bags to get that up to a 3 inch deep substrate.

But damn, it sure looks nice!


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## 20 20

Tank I bought used was too scratched for me to be happy with, so I sold it, and bought a new one today. Painted the back black, and put the black flourite sand in it. More charcoal colored than pure black:



















I have 3 more bags on order to get to the 3" deep I want. But I do like how it looks, especially with a black background.


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## Ozymandias

Looks good, did you rins it?


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## 20 20

Yep, rinsed it well. Needed it, too.


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## 20 20

Rinsed the additional 3 bags and put it in the tank, so a total of 9 bags gives me 3", barely. Enough for me.


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## Ryzilla

I just looked on big als and I dont see a listing for flourite black. Can anyone provide a link for me to the flourite black at big als?


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## 20 20

I think they're out of stock. That's why I got my second order from Marine Depot:

http://www.marinedepot.com/ps_searchItem.aspx?IdCategory=&SearchText=flourite&parsed=1


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## Homer_Simpson

Ryzilla said:


> I just looked on big als and I dont see a listing for flourite black. Can anyone provide a link for me to the flourite black at big als?


How about:
http://www.mopsdirect.us/cgi-bin/So...strates.html?L+us+cnpb6226ff6fe56f+1208105317

$17.42 U.S. for a 7 kg bag. Not bad for the base price, but I don't know what they charge for shipping.

*Edit: *****Okay it seems they charge almost $35 for shipping and freight charges on top of the $17.42, so that would not make it worth your while. *


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