Problems With New Fluval 405

bonzo

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We got a new fluvel 405 external about a month ago.She has always been a bit noisy but worked fine but this past few days the flow of water seems to be very slow. We,ve taken her apart and theres nothing obvious wrong with her.Any ideas what the problem could be. :shout:
 
try cleaning the pipes out if these are slightly gunked up it can effect the flow rate.

have you cleaned the sponges etc and replaced any floss that could be gunked up?

also have you over filled the trays with media?

is there any trapped air in the canister?
 
try cleaning the pipes out if these are slightly gunked up it can effect the flow rate.

have you cleaned the sponges etc and replaced any floss that could be gunked up?

also have you over filled the trays with media?

is there any trapped air in the canister?

Have checked all that and hasnt made any difference
 
if you have checked all of that and it has nothing to do with any of them. as you said the powerhead is noisey it may be a fault with the motor. i would return the filter and tell the shop what has happened. if its not clogged up then its faulty. fluval externals in my experience are not the best and dont seem to be as robust or user friendly as many others on the market. if you can exchange it for an eheim or rena both are very good filters also tetratec get good reviews :good:
 
Swapped the 405 with a 305 from another tank and its working fine so it must be the filter itself. Media is just what came with it which doesn't even fill it.
 
Checked the impeller hasnt lost a wing, or the ceramic stick hasnt bust?
 
Agree with Tizer, definately want to pull the rotor off the ceramic axle and check both the axle and the two end-caps if it has them (I know eheim's have rubber end-caps that the ceramic stick is held by at the ends. I don't know if Fluval does that the same way.)

WD
 
When I setup my new 405 it was noisy, and i wasn't happy. I wrestled with it late into the night and I finally got it right and whisper quiet, which is how it is supposed to be, these are the hints i can offer that saved my from a long argument with the LFS..

I pulled the unit down, left the hoses in the tank and uncoupled the impeller cover, wiped it over and reseated it with the loud click that needs to be heard ( make sure you are not putting the impeller cover in place and then helping the 'click' along by squeezing the two tabs designed to remove it, really push hard to seat it in place until they click by themselves, if you 'help it' by pushing the tabs into place, you are in fact making things worse, push it in there REALLY hard to make it click by itself and lock into place.

Make sure the tubes connecting to the aqua stop valve are well seated, and when you do up the locking nuts, make sure they are tight, but not so tight that they distort the end of the tube, otherwise air ingress will result and the thing will never run quietly or smoothly.

It will take AGES to prime the 405 with the little plunger ,and I mean AGES, if that is all you use, you will be there forever, take my advice, whip off the outflow nozzle and suck on the end of the outflow like a demon, when it has a bit of flow on it's own, you are almost there, and THEN you can use the priming plunger.

Once you have it running for a while, rock it back and forth and side to side, you will find s surprising amount of air being expelled from the unit and coming out the outflow, do this every few minutes for about 15 minutes to 1 hour until you are satisfied no more air is actually being expelled, the do it again the next day and there will be a little more air to expel, if you still have air being expelled every day, your hoses are not quite perfectly seated on the aqua stop valve, and you need to reseat them.

The unit is noisy, annoyingly so, for as long a there is air in the system (either captured or induced by s not perfect tube sealing). Once you go through all that, the noise will stop and it will never be a problem again..

I hope this helps, it does not hurt to take off the oring and reseat that, maybe with a little silicone grease/oil or vaseline while you attempt to reseat the impeller cover.. I find when the unit is new, the oring is twisted in the packaging, you need to make sure when you lay it around the unit that it is not trying to roll or twist back to it's packaged shape, this will allow air in, and help make more noise..

Let me know how you go, but if it sounds like a coffee grinder, and the impeller is not damaged, its air in the system starving the unit of flowing water..
 
We got a new fluvel 405 external about a month ago.She has always been a bit noisy but worked fine but this past few days the flow of water seems to be very slow. We,ve taken her apart and theres nothing obvious wrong with her.Any ideas what the problem could be. :shout:

i put a fair wedge, on the fact, that the impeller needs replacing, I'd do the shaft too.
 

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