Fluval 204 Mod. (May work with other fluvals.

Skip this if you want to get stright to work.

Cleaning out my fluval today, and notice my inlet was sucking in really weak...

Then i took it apart to clean since it was just doing a test run in my tank for a few days, so the canister was empty but for a sponge to see how much it sucked up.

So i took it out, and cleaned it out, found alot of sand on the bottom (i have sand for substrate) so it must of been doing its job.

Then i took the aqua stop off. Notice the intake side was stuck open. Pushed it around, turned out that theres sand in there and caused it to stay open.

Then it hit me...

How can a filter this large, have a intake this small...if a cricket or somthing (i feed live crickets) got sucked up it would pretty much clog the intake causing my tank to overflow.

So i fiddled around with it and decided it would be a good writeup.

Click to expand...

So heres how to make your intake fully open to take in large sized waste.

All you need is some niddle noise pliers...finger nails would be good. And thats it.





See the little grey ball? Its the number 1 cause of the cloging...so it needs to go.

Step one, take the rubber seal off that holds the grey ball in. Just slides off with a lil force, be gentle tho.


Then the ball should pop right out, if it was jamed like mines..pull it out with the pliers.


Then, your gonna see some ridges inside the intake. (I forgot to take a before shot, so ignore the right side, witch is the intake, and look at the left.)


Stick your pliers in there, and break off all the plastic stuff.


Then somthing like this should fall out.


And your done...just clean up the job and put the rubber seal back on. And this is how it should look like.
(Right= Outlet Left= Inlet)



Then your done, throw away all the plastic and that lil grey ball...you wont be needing them.


Note: If you want water to exit even faster (for spray bar users) you can do the same to the outlet side.
I decided to keep mines since it keeps the water from flowing back out the hose when i disconnet the aqua stop from the canister.

OPTIONAL MOD

If your scared of your small fish getting sucked in...get the fluval strainer.


Open it up, and get rid of the little white ball that keeps the water from back flowing.


Done, now have fun with your new and improved Fluval. :Angel: