Marineland Rite-Size K Cartridge Mod

Tyyrlym

Some more Eclipse modifications for ya'll. I recently added a live plant to my Eclipse System 6. Since I wanted to begin adding fertilizers and carbon additive to the water I was going to need to stop having activated carbon in the filter lest it suck the ferts right out of the water as quick as I added them.

As you can see in my Eclipse review, http://www.fishforum.com/aquarium-pr...tem-6-a-19721/ , and in my filter mod, http://www.fishforum.com/diy-aquariu...iverter-20166/ , the filter is designed very specifically for use with a Marineland Rite-Size K cartridge in mind. Proper water distribution through the mechanical filter requires it lest a ton of water pass only through the first few inches of the cartridge and prematurely wear out the cartridge. So any modification was going to require the use of the cartridge.

My first mod was a disaster. Short story, I tried to cut the blue mechanical filter top off, dump out carbon, stuff it with bonded filter pad and then put a piece of bonded filter pad on top. It was a mess, we do not speak of it.

My second attempt came in from the bottom:



As you can see I used a box cutter to trim out some of the bottom grate and then dumped the carbon out. It's actually a surprisingly large amount. Probably sufficient to remain useful out to the cartridge's advertised life span. Go Marineland. At this point I could put the cartridge in and be done with it. It would be just as good a mechanical filter as it was before with just no carbon. I just can't leave well enough alone though.

As you can see here:



I cut up small strips of bonded filter pad and stuffed them into the cavities that used to hold carbon.

It's a relatively simple mod that anyone can do for their planted Eclipse tanks. In fact given the construction of all Marineland Rite-Size cartridges you can perform this mod on just about any Marineland filter to remove the carbon.

aunt kymmie

I have the same tank as you, planted. I totally forgot about that carbon filter. I will be needing to do the same mod as you as I also want to dose with ferts. Thanks for the great tip!

Tyyrlym

Update

The filter pad finally gave out. A five month run isn't too bad though I wouldn't advise taking it that long. The extra filter pad I stuffed in certainly increased the pad's resistance to flow. After a few months n service the water started to back up and overflow the filter. Not a big deal, it tips forward slightly so the excess water flowed over the side and back into the tank. It was minimal enough for me to not worry about it. It finally came to a head though when the pad was resistant enough that enough water was backing up to start overflowing the rear of the filter. The filter is close enough to the back that the water puddled on the rim and then dribbled out. Suffice it to say overnight I lost about a 1/4" of water dribbled out the back of my tank. I did a major clean of my tank, dumped the old pad, and made a new one and installed it.

I would recommend that anyone who does this mod replace the cartridge about once every three to four months so as to avoid the overflow.