!@#$ing filter!

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Endgame319

Aquarium Advice FINatic
Joined
Jan 11, 2004
Messages
696
Location
Edmonton AB, Canada
I was doing last minute filter maintainence just now, as I am leaving on a two week vacation tomorrow morning (someone will come in to feed the fish). I unplugged all the equipment while I was doing a water change but when I turned everything back on, the ACMini doesn't turn back on. Theres no sound at all coming out of it. It was working fine the minute before :(. I have NO backup filters, except for a giant air-pump that doesn't work either. Is there anything I can do? Can I jump-start my filter some how? I got it used so I have no idea how old it is. It looks like its in decent shape. I think the algae in the intake tube was really tiring out the motor, and it just died. Any suggestions? Its 9:14 and the fish stores are closed. The nearest walmart is a 20 minute drive away, and I dont have a car, and my parents are too busy packing to drive me anywhere :(. What can I do AA?
 
I just thought of something, I dont know if this will work, but could I put all the tiger barbs and loaches in with the SA Cichlids? The biggest cichlid I have is the 3" firemouth. My cichlids are VERY mean, and the only reason they dont bother the tetra and shark is because they were there first. Everything I've put in there since them they've killed. I think this is my only option :(
 
Clean the impeller first. If that fails, plug in the filter, take out the intake tube , fill the filter with water, then whack the impeller with a pen/chopstick/whatever to get it moving.

I am also curious as to why you unplug all of your equipment do to a water change :p
 
I unplug the stuff because I do large water changes (40%), the water level goes below the intake and the heater.

I'll try cleaning the impeller
 
Mine too! In fact, I tried the push the impeller thing and it never worked... ended up gettin a new one. :(
 
No need to unplug the filters when doing a water change, just get filter intake extensions. They are like $1.50 and get the intake low enough in the tank so that you do not have to turn off the filter, and they catch more waste.
 
grimlock3000 said:
No need to unplug the filters when doing a water change, just get filter intake extensions. They are like $1.50 and get the intake low enough in the tank so that you do not have to turn off the filter, and they catch more waste.

Catch more waist. Thats what I need to do. Thanks
 
That's the answer!! My AC150 acts up everytime I do a water change

Same here, I just push the impeller with something to get it started. It used to be a mystery, it would happen from time to time but sooner or later start again. I was watching a show on the History channel about the old airplanes and was like :idea: . The next time it happened I poked the impeller and it worked!
 
First clean the impeller, make sure its level, and give it a jumpstart with a pen or something. Happens all the time.

Dave

Oh I just saw that you already did this, good job! :) :roll:
 
Catch more waist. Thats what I need to do. Thanks

Yep, it is a very good investment. One LFS had the extensions for $4+ each but luckily I found a place selling them for $1.50. I have entensions in both of my tanks to get the intakes about 2 or 3 inches about the substrate. I have to use three(!) to get the intake on my AC200 to a good spot in the bow front tank:

26g3.jpg
 
You could, you just need to take more precautions with a prefilter since sand is more likely to find its way to the filter inlet if it is lower in the tank.
 
I just keep unplugging them and plugging them back in and that seems to get my filters going again. Even with the extensions though, it doesn't seem the filter is strong enough to pull the water up where the connections go. Am I making sense? where you connect the intake tube to another intake tube seems to have a leak and the filter won't filter when the water gets past that part.
 
It can do it. I can drain half the water out of my deep bow front tank and the AC200 still pulls the water all the way up the intake.

Here are my filters going during some maintenence. Thery barely even slow down at this point:

redo1.jpg
 
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