Secondary Water Containment for Canister Filter

feederfish

feederfish

AC Members
Feb 7, 2009
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Mobile, AL
I will be running three Fluval 305 canisters on my 150 gallon setup. I still have to build a stand, but was wondering if anyone puts their canisters in or over a sump to catch water if there would be a leak? By sump, I mean anything... Rubbermaid, bucket, etc. I was thinking I would prefer to do something to prevent gallons of water ruining my carpet in the event I blow out an O-ring or gasket.

Can I put the inlets up high (or higher) to also limit this risk? Or is this not recommended since filtering may be impacted?

I see leaking seems to be a problem with some people and cansiters, and a bad leak could be potentially very bad.

I honestly was thinking of placing all three in a Rubbermaid like 30 gallon storage bin and placing the inlets at about 5 inches below the waterline.

Please, let me know what you take on this is and if you have better ideas. Am i just being a bit paranoid?
 
ibr3ak said:
I've got 2 of my 404's in 5 gallon buckets and have drilled a small hole (about 1.5"-2" below water line) on both of my intakes, so if the o-ring does blow and water starts spilling, it'll only spill the amount of water above the drilled hole.
Click to expand...


this sounds like an interesting concept. would you be able to post pics of it? i'm still a tad confused as to what you mean about putting a hole in the intake.
 
That is very well thought out. In fact I'm highly surprised such a fail safe feature isn't already incorporated onto the filters already. You could even add a properly sized rubber stopper to allow the filter to continue running during large water changes if you so desire.

I'm totally about to drill that hole in all of my inlets.
 
Very interested concept. Does the hole near the water line effect the water circulation of the tank or the ability for the intake to suck up all the garbage in the water? How big of a hole did you drill?
 
Thanks guys :)

@Echo good idea about the rubber plugs during wc's :)

@boobie I haven't measured the drilled hole (can't even recall what size drill bit I've used), but any hole big enough to let the air in will break the syphon.

Here's the thread from my diy fluval parts:
http://www.aquariacentral.com/forums/showthread.php?t=146412

also the drilled hole doesn't effect the suction on the bottom intake, it sucks the stuff up as it should.

@huff even though it's a good failsafe, there is a flaw, as soon as your syphon breaks and remaining water spills out of the canister, there is a possibility that the filter will run dry so for that reason alone I doubt they'll incorporate it.

But it will be cheaper to replace filter parts for folks with carpeting or hard wood flooring :)
 
ibr3ak said:
Thanks guys :)

@Echo good idea about the rubber plugs during wc's :)

@boobie I haven't measured the drilled hole (can't even recall what size drill bit I've used), but any hole big enough to let the air in will break the syphon.

Here's the thread from my diy fluval parts:
http://www.aquariacentral.com/forums/showthread.php?t=146412

also the drilled hole doesn't effect the suction on the bottom intake, it sucks the stuff up as it should.

@huff even though it's a good failsafe, there is a flaw, as soon as your syphon breaks and remaining water spills out of the canister, there is a possibility that the filter will run dry so for that reason alone I doubt they'll incorporate it.

But it will be cheaper to replace filter parts for folks with carpeting or hard wood flooring :)
Click to expand...

Nice DIY Fluval parts.

What if the bucket was taller then the filter itself. In the case of a leak, the filter would still be submerged and not able to run dry. Except it leaves the fact that one has the chance of being electrocuted by submerging the filter in a bucket of water.

Btw, off topic. But is that your own HDR photo ibr3ak? It's a sweet shot.
 
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