kevinlo

Hi Rob, Is the venturi before or after the intake? It only works well if the venturi is before the intake. Here's what I did. Take the stock venturi attachment for the maxijet. Cut down the nubs on one end of the venturi so that those nubs fit snugly in the pump intake. I glued mine in place with weld-on #16 but that's not absolutely necessary. The next enhancement is to cut off half the width of the impeller blades and do a mesh mod. That will result in pulling much more air and finer bubbles. If that's still not enough air, you can add wooden airstones. A few mods make the backpack a very nice little skimmer. Oh, and pulling the bio bale out of the second chamber and replacing it with chaeto and a clip on lamp seems to work as well. The chaeto grows very fast. I'll try to post some pics of my setup. Kevin

I spoke to Lou at American Marine Pinpoint and he figured out the problem. The glass inside the probe, under the plastic outer tube, was broken. Apparently I tightened the probe holder right to the threshold of breaking. It worked for a month, then in a recent temperature change, the plastic may have expanded just enough to break it. So the moral is, don't overtighten those probe ports. Lou offered to replace it for free since it had only been a month. I don't think I'll take him up on it though since the issue was on my end. Anyways, lesson learned. Excellent customer service from American Marine! Kevin

Somehow I always find issues in the wee hours of the morning The probe reads 7 in tankwater with a ph of 8.2 and in effluent with a ph of 6.2. And in vinegar with a ph around 2.5. Re-calibrating doesn't work. If I recalibrate to the 4.0 fluid, the 7.0 fluid will then appear to be 4.0. This is confirmed on 2 controllers. The controllers are OK, because they work on another PH probe. It seems strange that the probe would stop working so suddenly. I just wonder what caused it to fail. Is it that black cat that crossed my path at Home Depot the other day?

A nearly new ph probe stopped working and now reads a ph of around 7 in both of my controllers no matter what the actual ph of the solution is. This probe was running in a calcium reactor for about a month on a Milwaukee controller and of course I found my CO2 running non-stop. This probe was from Pinpoint. Another probe from pinpoint has been running fine in my sump for about a year. Both controllers are working OK. Has anyone else had this happen? Could the CO2 in the reactor somehow cause a failure? The bulb tip looks physically fine. Do these things have warranties? Sorta aggrivating at 1:00 in the morning.

I just purchased the same regulator to replace a Milwaukee at Dan's recommendation. The needle valve actually works on this thing! With a controller and a PH probe in the reactor, I'm not sure precise control is such a concern so this may be overkill but it seems like a quality unit and as a bonus the different form factor fits in it's little location in my stand a bit better. Here's a link if anyone is interested: Aquarium plants regulator

I'd skip the D&D stuff btw. I bought some from premium aquatics just to try it out. It's very chalky and breaks apart in the water when it sets. I"m going to stick with the aquastik stuff and just tone the skimmer down to deal with the excess foaming.