battery-vacs

[Mr Burns]

any comments on the battery powered gravel vacuums? when i clean the gravel in my current tank, i usually have to siphone about 50% of the water out, fill it back up, then siphon some more in order to clean all the gravel. i do partial water changes every two weeks, so i was wondering if one of those those battery powered gravel vacuums might be a good piece of equipment to have. i like the idea of being able to clean a quarter of the tank's gravel every week without having to fill and refill it constantly... i'd even be willing to go for the eheim sludge extractor if it has good marks...

also, i know i can't use it for re-filling the tank b/c of our really base water, but would a python be a better choice for cleaning the gravel and doing water changes?

[jaydro]

Just moments ago I was giving the Penn Plax Super Battery Vac a try. It's pretty much just a cheaply-made toy. Not much suction--it could not lift my medium-sized gravel at the bottom of my 25 gal tank with two brand new batteries. The instructions said to hold it just above the gravel, but to have any effect at all I had to burrow it into the gravel surface. The most distressing thing was that it had a pronounced tendency to disassemble itself with use--the power head would come off the tube, resulting in water being sprayed everywhere, etc. A very frustrating disappointment.

Like you I was wanting a method to vacuum gravel without pretty much emptying my tank with the siphon. Never mind that I have difficulty controlling the siphon itself with just my two hands, and don't need the additional complication of maneuvering it around trying to clean gravel at the same time.

The Python seems like overkill to me, but....

[Mr Burns]

i just got a python last week and i freakin love it. yesterday, i cleaned the usual 25% section of gravel, removed about 40% of the water, and refilled the tank. total time of getting things out, set up, cleaned, filled, and put away: under and hour. before, it would have taken me several hours to do it. our water is really alkaline and has a noticeable amount of chlorine, so when refilling, i premixed a 1 gallon bucket of pH balancer and dechlorinator (enough to treat the entire tank), put the bucket in the tank, then put the python over that so the tap water would mix with the treated water in the bucket. filling took about 4 minutes, which would have normally taken at least an hour. the suction is great because our city water actually has A LOT of water pressure. i wouldn't want to live in the older section of town a bit west of here b/c their water pressure is horrid..i could see where that would cause a problem.