So I popped in to my usual MH aquatics and had a chat with my old boss. Told him I was looking to upgrade my filter (despite the 1000U I was using being well over rated for my tank anyway) - struck a deal on an Aqua Manta EFX 1500 (1500l/ph, rated to 450 litres, holds around 20 litres of water itself!) - due to the gap between my bed and my cabinet being quite small I had to stick the filter in the other side. Slight size difference...!
Twice the size easily...! Transferred over my biological media and off she went
🙂 Has a brilliant self priming function so its genuinely effortless to operate. Barely fits in the cabinet and is a heavy old beast to move though!
Had to use the new fittings etc as the pipework is a lot bigger. All went together easily though and best of all: a full length spraybar! (my arm isn't as fat as it looks in that picture, honestly!)
And an FTS after it was installed. Quite a lot of sediment billowing around thanks to the extra flow. Tank looks a lot more open now as I have removed the powerhead and there is no longer a spraybar on the right hand side.
Within an hour the tank looked visibly cleaner and nicer! This morning it was even better... Suspect the water is a lot clearer as there is a nice big bag of carbon in there now
🙂 Am back away for work all week so will be interested to see how it looks after a week!