FX5 modding

[jkam]

Has anyone tried modding their FX5?? I came across this site but I want to see if there's any easier ways to mod it. There's so much bypass and I want to use some of Eheim's prefilter media in it.

The Fluval Fx5 by Hagen

[hgi]

I use the elbow output mod, and I just pulled all the pre-filter foam around the baskets and filled that area with bio rings.

[jkam]

Don't the rings fall out when you service the filter?

[Aquaman]

I have one f-x5 with the original outer foams the top bin - pot scrubbers - center bin -bio balls and the last eihiem stock filter media. I use another with stock outer pads and upper med fine foam ( cut to fit ) and the bottom 2 for filter pad material...this one slows down quite a bit but the other takes care of the important stuff .
good idea on the outer foam v/s bio media ...though some of the smaller ones would fall through ...most would not.

[hgi]

Don't the rings fall out when you service the filter?

No, the rings around the rims of the baskets are in mesh bags, I have a course foam in the fx5's intake nozzle that I clean out every week, w/c (this is to stop any large debris from entering the canister). Just opened my filter for the 1st time a few weeks ago after running it for 8 month and it was very clean so I'm not going to bother opening it for another year unless something weird happens.

I think I was able to fit about 3.75 boxes of Bio MAX (small rings) around each basket, so an extra 10.5 boxes of media in replace of the filter foam.