This summer we set up a small pool in our yard. It's the kind that you can set up yourself in a few minutes. It came with a canister pool filter. Well, the pool got a leak in it and if we buy a new pool, it'll come with it's own filter, so I was thinking maybe I could use the old filter in one of my tanks. It's only been used for two summers, and we rarely kept it on. The filter looks like this one

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The filter media is like this

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The filter comes with plastic screens to cover the intake and the return tubes. The only thing is that it uses metal rings to hold the tubes on. I may be able to replace them with plastic ones. So, could I convert this into an efficient aquarium filter?

i'd say it's possible. if it was me doing it i'd want to know how much water the filter pumps per hour and i'd be looking at the possibility of using 'normal' fish tank filter material as although the existing filter material would work to an extent, not as well as decent fish filter material will. my main concern with the existing material would be that it might be a bit too fine and clog up too quickly. plus it has a lot of volume but not a lot of actual filter material. if u could take out the white bits and fill it with fish tank filter material it would have a lot more effective biological and mechanical filtration potential.

i guess a filter this size could be used to filter one very big tank/pond or several smaller ones if u had some way of splitting the inputs and outputs.

if u have a go at it, good luck and let us know how u get on.

Never even thought of that. VERY cool idea.

Definately keep us updated on how it goes. If I had to guess, I'd bet you'll get it to work.

Bettina if you do use this as a fillter, can you document it as it could make a very good thread

I was thinking of using funky's idea of making your own pre filter inserts for powerheads. I could put some of the filter foam into the plastic cage around the intake and maybe the return tube, since the holes in it are big enough for a small fish to get caught. I may be able to fit more filter material into the filter since the current filter part doesn't take up the whole space. Maybe I could stick something into the hole in the middle of the filter part. The filter was for a pool 18 feet across by 3 feet high, so it's probably quite strong. I'll try to find out the gallons per hour for it. Is there any special way I sould clean this before use? The pool did have chlorine in it, though the filter hasn't been running for many months now.

i personaly would clean the fillter before i used it, you could use a very week bleach solution first, then give it a good wash of with clean water

Just a bit of soaking, and agitation would get rid of any residual chlorine. I have concerns as to wether it's been impregnated with any other chemicals.

I wouldn't have thought there would be much need for a high pressure / high volume pump on that type of pool, so that aspect should be ok.