Fed up with Eheim and Fluval canister filters
- Thread starter bigignatz
- Start date
You should really care about your tank more than to let a filter go uncleaned for that long.
I've never used an Eheim filter but have Fluval and dislike them. I have been using multiple Rena xp3 canisters for the longest time now and have zero complaints. They are great filters in my opinion.
I am not a fan of the Eheim pro 3. The plastic they used looks really cheap. I have the Eheim pro 2 and I think its build a lot better. With this being said NEW is not always better. Some people still love the Eheim classic and I see why.
I use a rubber lubricant spray from eheim to make the rubber seal last longer. You should try that.
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Leaking isn't the problem. Loss of flow and eventual total failure of the motor is. I'm done with Eheims after a total failure and the death of quite a few fish. However, I'll keep this in mind if I have leaks before I can replace these.
By the way, what are the references to "feeding the troll" and "troll posts"? I'm being honest in my opinion that these filters are junk, based on my recent experiences and the high cost to eventual inevitable failure rate. Sorry if some people have an intense fealty to Chinese made crap. Many of us have been well trained to expect things to last only a year or two. Personally, I'd rather not lose fish that are in many cases rare or diffiuct to spawn due to failure of a poorly designed filter, as was recently the case.
Rather just build my own. I've pretty much decided on using a modular approach, Blueline pumps, some sort of prefab canister and a detritus trap in line before the rest. In other tanks I'm going to try the "veg filter" approach and see how that works...
Thanks very much for all of your suggestions.
By the way, what are the references to "feeding the troll" and "troll posts"? I'm being honest in my opinion that these filters are junk, based on my recent experiences and the high cost to eventual inevitable failure rate. Sorry if some people have an intense fealty to Chinese made crap. Many of us have been well trained to expect things to last only a year or two. Personally, I'd rather not lose fish that are in many cases rare or diffiuct to spawn due to failure of a poorly designed filter, as was recently the case.
Rather just build my own. I've pretty much decided on using a modular approach, Blueline pumps, some sort of prefab canister and a detritus trap in line before the rest. In other tanks I'm going to try the "veg filter" approach and see how that works...
Thanks very much for all of your suggestions.
When you get a filter, it is like everything in life -- you mileage may vary. I have two eheim 2228s and two 2260s over 13 years now. Two fluval 404 at (about) 3 years. One fx5 @ 1 1/2 years. One 205 at +1 year. No problem with any of them. I do absolutely "hate" the eheim double tap connectors for the 2260 intake hose. They work well at first but start having problems in no time at all!!! Unfortunately, without them, it would be almost impossible for me to clean them without getting tons of water all over the floor.
I've own Fluval Fx5s, 405, and 404. I just started an Eheim Ecco 2236. And I also have a JBJ Reaction 4 Stage. So far, so good. I will have to say that my Fluvals are my favorites so far. The Eheim Ecco was given to me by a friend after the impeller broke (broke after just a year) so I had to replace it and both of us were pretty disappointed on the flow rate. The filter is rated for tanks up to 80g, but seems that the flow rate would be best on a 20g (which is what it's being used for now) or maybe a 29g (friend had it on this size tank, but he was disappointed on the flow rate on his 29g). The JBJ's aquastop started to leak on me just a few months ago, but it's no biggie on the aquastop since I clean my filters once every 4-6 months and it only leaks through the bottom (into the canister anyways if it was running). The 404 had multiple issues with the impeller cover and the aquastop. The 405 is running strong ( been running for 5 years and never had to replace any parts) and my Fx5s (only issues in the past was a rat chewed through the wiring and it clogged easily when I had all filters pads in one as I was using it more as a Mechanical Filter) have been the best so far.
We shouldn't have to deal with catastrophic failure of any canister filter, and Eheim should be ashamed of themselves. I'm call the rep on Monday to see what he/she has to say about this sort of thing. I'd also be interested to know if there is anybody who can explain to me the eventual loss of flow even in regularly maintained filters...is this a problem with the crummy motors they use? Any electrical engineering types out there who'd care to comment?
Maybe water conditions in certain places exacerbate problems with low quality stuff, but it shouldn't.
I'm also finding that with some careful shopping I can find off the shelf components to produce a filter that's more powerful and reliable than both Eheims and Fluvals, with none of the cheap plastic parts found on both. For the money that you pay even for a Fluval, they should make the parts that receive stress when servicing the filter out of stainless steel. If I need an off the shelf unit from the LFS or box store I'd probably go back to Fluvals as they seem to be less prone to output reduction and catastrophic failure, based on my own experience and from what people are saying here, but I'm pretty much sold on semi-DIY or the veg/total DIY idea. I saw a video I think on Youtube on how to slap together a mini-canister out of an Otter case and some very cheap stock pumps that are minimally the equivalent of what's in the Fluval pumps, and apparently they don't leak which is a major problem with the off the shelf mini-canisters. About the same price as the mini-canisters but obviously more time involved.
Going to start building my own lighting as well...I'm paying another $200 for a Coralite in which the switch burns out or it otherwise fails. I stupidly bought a bunch of those on sale last year and 50% of them are now unusable and will be retrofitted with VHO conversion kits using waterproof ends and other thing that should be on all these lights anyway, even from a safety perspective. I think the industry is completely screwed up at this point - they're going for lowest price point and if a cheaply made light gives you a taser-like shock or a zap that stops your pacemaker, why should they care? I've had heaters, expensive ones, fail on me as well to the detriment of fish and humans (nothing like pulling a heater from a tank and find out that it not only isn't working but shocks the bejeezus out of you as well - had this happen last week with an upper-end supposedly fully submersible unit.
All of this begs the question of why any of this stuff should be dangerous to fish or human alike. If we don't start demanding more out of these people (and yes, maybe pay say 20% more or so for some good quality control and overall improvements in safety and performance, although I think this mostly comes down to greed in a competitive industry and they should produce safe products to begin with) then we can only expect to get more unusable crap and lose more fish...and maybe spend that money we think we're saving on the deductible to an ER visit or in replacing dead animals.
At the risk of sounding like an old codger, back when stuff was made in the U.S. in the 60's and 70s and maybe up into the '80s it lasted. It wasn't technically sophisticated, but a "Silent Giant" pump would go for 20 years with maybe a change of the diaphragm at the most. the lighting (such as it was) was wired correctly, came in stainless steel housing and lasted forever. And those old Metaframe tanks lasted forever and were easy to reseal if they leaked. I know there's no way to compete with Asian labor costs and lack of environmental enforcement, but maybe there's a middle ground here between having to buy Chinese garbage and ridiculously overpriced ADA stuff. I think there is, it's called DIY and then eventually the big manufacturers will come around when sales decrease.
End of rant...
