# Clean Your Intake Tubes



## Tyyrlym (Jun 1, 2008)

I have a sort of ritual I got through when I clean my aquarium. Scrape the glass. Siphon out five gallons. Rinse intake strainer in the water. Dump it. Siphon out five more gallons. Clean filter pads. Dump it. Vacuum the sand and siphon five more gallons doing it. Dump it. I don't deviate much at all from this plan, it takes care of everything I need to do and if I follow the pattern it all gets done no problem. Yesterday I deviated from that procedure and it proved to be worth it. I now have a new step in my ritual.

Well I was rinsing out my intake strainer and I was holding the U-tube of my Penguin filter and I figured, eh, what the heck. Flipping the U-tube over I submerged it quickly in the bucket, just intending to swish it a few times for good measure and put it back. To my surprise and disgust the tube immediately puked out a ton of crud. Several more dunkings got even more gunk out. I spent a good ten minutes dunking, swishing, and doing my best to clean out what I'd found. The end result:










Algae, fish poo, gunk, and just stuff I'd rather not think about.

Moral of the story kids, give your HoB intake tubes a good rinse once in a while.


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## aspects (Feb 1, 2009)

a nice wide bristled pipe cleaner should do the trick. it will get everything swishing left behind


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## Tyyrlym (Jun 1, 2008)

Believe me, it's on my list of things I need to buy.


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## aunt kymmie (Jun 2, 2008)

I do weekly water changes, and clean the intake/outake tubes at the same time. I'm always amazed by how much "gunk" comes out. I usually end up with twice the amount in the bucket that Tyyrylm shows. Hopefully that means our HOB's are just working very well at their jobs.


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## onefish2fish (Jul 22, 2008)

before ever getting into saltwater it never really hit me how much junk is in the water. not to long along i added a heavy duty protein skimmer and you'd be amazed at the brown sludge it pulls only from rapidly "blending" the water unlike how a HOB or canister filter works catching food particles and poop. i posted a picture in my bowfront thread if you wish to see. amazing. lol


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## jeaninel (Aug 24, 2007)

I believe the Marineland Emperor filters include a cleaning brush. I wish they'd include one with their Penguin series also. It's amazing how much gunk can build up in there.


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## Tyyrlym (Jun 1, 2008)

Given that it's the highest flow point in the tank I really didn't expect that kind of build up. Some tough surface algae maybe but not the chunky soup I got out of it.


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## willow (Sep 9, 2006)

i gave all my tubes a good clean out,when i re vamped the tank
a little while back,flushed them throu with a blast from the outside tap.
got shot of some slimy gunk.


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