aiiight, sorry for the delay. Updates a comin:
Half filled or so, no leaks yet. Gravel is looking especially pretty at this time.
By "pretty" i mean "kill me now"
All the way filled. Cloudy and such, but filled and leak free
My son yelled a little too late for me to shut off the hose, so we had some run over.
Canopy on and some really cheesy decorations installed.
It's really nothing special, and it WILL NOT stay this way, but I did it anyway because a) i CANNOT look at an empty tank for any length of time and b) i had em already. it's all about the free right now. After cycling, filtration setup etc etc things will change for the better. it'll be awhile before I put the inhabitants in.
Now, onto filtration. I have had a Fluval 404 for about 7 or 8 years. It's been in storage for close to 6 years so i figured it'd be perfect for this tank, and most importantly, free!
The soap is there for perspective. Well, actually it fell and I just didn't care enough to move it out of the shot Anyway, you may ask why it's in the bathtub. You'd be intelligent and wise in your curiosity.
The damn thing leaks!
I have no pics of the water mess on the floor, cuz i was in a hurry to clean it before it ran under the mush wood and crumbled the stand to a gooey pile of mushwood crap.
Let me show pics of what i think is the problem before explaining what i think is the problem
Lets see if i can describe the filter without any sexual inuendos, puns or suggestivness
First off, for those of you who dont know, the Fluval is a cannister filter, meaning it sits outside of the tank. It has an input and an output (back to the tank) which makes it a closed loop system. The hoses you see in the previous picture are those input/output lines and the apparatus that connects em (lets call it a gonkulator) to the cannister fits down inside those holes on the top of the cannister. Here's a closeup of the holes that are penetrated by the pulsing gonkulator as it throbs and impregnates the cannister with warm flowing sensual water. (damn. so close)
(The blue biscuit deal that has "start" around is the primer. you lovinly pump it up and down. Up and down. UUUUPPPP....annnnd...dowwwwwwn. (this is hawt) and it basically force starts the filter and primes all the siphoning and....sucking..i mean suction.
Close up of the gonkulator
Now you may be saying "Well there's your problem idiotboy Loogie. You retarded monkey of a fish keeping jackass. That rubber gasket there is broke. Stupid piece of crap that you are, you didn't even know"
And you'd be right for the most part, however I dont believe that is the problem. Allow me to retort.
No water seems to exit where the gonkulator sits in those holes.
The cannister leaks from the side of the blue clamps. About 2 drips per second. mayyybe 1 drip. Both sides
A close up of the exact spot it's leaking from . Left side on both clamps so the leaks are caddy corner to each other. if that makes sense
Let me show you the whole rig opened up, spread eagle and waiting...man these filters are promiscuous eh?
This is the moter housing. It sits on top of the cannister. It's flipped upside down in this shot. On it is the rubber seal that seals the moter housing to the cannister.
It would appear that this is in fact faulty since the leaks are occuring between the cannister/motor housing and no water is running over the top of the gonkulator etc etc.
Here's the motor housing (stil updside down) with the ring installed. There's no visible cracks or stretching of the seal that I can see at all. It looks...good for the most part
And here it is w/o my mits in the way
Now I did notice that when putting the motor housing on the cannister and clamping it down, it doesn't seem to want to clamp. It's very hard to clamp and the motor housing does appear to not be sitting flush w/ the cannister. That leads me to believe that the cannister is slighly warped or the seal is getting in the way and the 2 can't join properly. You know, in holy matrimony.
Here you can see the seal looks slightly swelled or like it could possibly be getting in the way of the union between the motor housing and cannister.
I dont have any good shots of how the 2 are joining, but i'll take about 30 pics when i get home so you can see what I mean.
So now here's my dilemma: looking online I found that the large gasket that seals the motor housing to the cannister is about $7 American. A new cannister (if it is in fact warped) is about $35 or so. I couldn't find any place that was selling the seal that goes around the gonkulator (the one that is broke in the pic) I'm not really willing to spend $35 on a new cannister. I'd rather put that into a DIY filtration system and get it down Loogie-like. Of course, I do not want to spend the money right now either.
I could:
a) order the large seal and hope that's it. It wont be, but whatever.
b) Wait until the money is available and build my own with a sump. I imagine the cost would be close to $60 (including the sump)
c) try to find a Fluval 404 that's still for sale at a store somewhere, buy it, and try the parts on mine until I figure out what's faulty, then take back the new fluval and buy the part online.
d) instead take back my faulty fluval and say it leaks and get my money back.
Any thoughts, comments, concerns, free filters, free beer?
i almost peed a little , lol
