Air Pump Above Or Below The Tank?

[martyn21uk]

I'm moving house and thus gonna be changing the set up of my tank.

Previously I've had my air pump positioned above my tank on a shelf with all my bits as I'm sure that I read somewhere that it needs to be above the level of your water line to work effectively.
In its new location, this isn't gonna be possible and I want to house it underneath the tank.

Am I gonna encounter any problems realistically from this?

 

[Miss Wiggle]

don't think so, i've had them below before with no problems. make sure you fit a non return valve though so that if the pump fails you don't drain the tank through the airline

 

[martyn21uk]

Already fitted thanks for the reassurance Wiggster

 

[waterdrop]

Just to confirm what MW said:

Air pumps work well from anywhere. (As depth of water increases, the pump has to work harder.) The whole recommendation for putting them on a shelf several inches above the aquarium water line is just an alternative to having a non-return valve. If the power goes out and the pump is enough inches above, then gravity will overcome the small suction that might be created by the stopped pump diaphragm and gravity will keep the water from crawling up the skinny airline and damaging the pump.

If you have a non-return valve, that takes care of that water-damage risk and you can put the pump anywhere relative to the aquarium.

This is my take and as usual, if any experienced hardware folks want to correct or add, please do!

~~waterdrop~~
(The above just repeats exactly what MW said, but as a newbie I know it sometimes feels good to read several members echoing agreement on things. )

 

[Miss Wiggle]

(The above just repeats exactly what MW said, but as a newbie I know it sometimes feels good to read several members echoing agreement on things. )

absolutley agree, you should never trust one person's advice, generally best to wait for a couple of people to chime in and say that's ok.

no one person is infallible and even i don't know everything (remember practically perfect)

 

[martyn21uk]

Okay, I appreciate what both of you are saying there and I hope its just general advice as I'm not a newbie and I know which members know what they're talking about and which don't. For the record, if something is written by somebody who i'm not sure on, then I'll go into their profile and read a few of their previous posts, its pretty easy to work out that way if they have a clue or not.

 

[Miss Wiggle]

Okay, I appreciate what both of you are saying there and I hope its just general advice as I'm not a newbie and I know which members know what they're talking about and which don't. For the record, if something is written by somebody who i'm not sure on, then I'll go into their profile and read a few of their previous posts, its pretty easy to work out that way if they have a clue or not.

nothing personal to you martyn

but tbh i don't think anyone should rely on advice because you think the member knows what they're talking about. everyone has areas of weaknesses and everyone can get things wrong from time to time. always best to get a couple of opinions.

 

[martyn21uk]

Fair point.

 

[waterdrop]

Yeah, when you stop and think about it, its quite difficult to judge. For instance, I was quite shocked when the forum software started giving me little fishies even though I was a newbie - then I realized it was just counting up posts and I was just "talking" a lot. So post numbers don't tell you much. And join date can't really say anything about real fishkeeping experience. Its funny how in the end it is just like conversations with friends - the more time goes by, the more you feel you kind of know where they are coming from.

And then to top it all off, its just like MW says, even a good person you trust or an expert or whoever can just say wrong things sometimes. Anyway that could get a little depressing to think about but at least one of the good things about web forums seems to be that more voices can sometimes help keep away those little mistakes.

~~waterdrop~~