[reefburnaby]

Sam,

I hope this is for a fish only tank...not a reef is it ?

Anyway, mechanical filtration...I have both Aquaclear and HOT Magnum. Both Aquaclears are in the garbage can (Mini and a 300). In order to be effective, you need quite a waterfall drop...otherwise there isn't enough water ripple to perform air/CO2 exchange. Nice and noisy. The strainer design isn't so hot....it sucks up debris and fish. We used to buy Aquaclear 500 foam and use that as a guard.

HOT Magnums are pretty good. I like them a lot and still use them in the goldfish tank. No problems with this one. Solid construction. Easy priming. Probably it will last me 10 years. These are about $100 and not everybody carries them (Petcetra comes to mind...and so does King Eds).

Maybe...you can rig something for a Fluval 104/204 with the regular hoses (not the special ribbed hoses). They sell them at J&L and you can probably build a bracket to make them a HOT.

As an alternative, I built my own HOT filter. I use it to clean my tank -- it's basically a recirculating siphon with a filter. It uses a Mag 5, a HD water filter, 30 micro paper filter and PVC piping. You could probably use a Maxijet in place of the Mag if you wanted to save cost, but I had a Mag 5 sitting there.

Say, do you still have the UV unit ? I keep forgetting to make arrangements for the unit.

- Victor.