Hi.

[Noel in fish]

My name is Noel ,I've had a tropical tank or two for about 10 years and currently have a 2 meter 400 litre tank in the lounge with South American cichlids ,uaru x2 Oscars x3, Severums x4 pearl X11 ,Texas x1,rainbow x2,convicts x6,silver dollars x5, Hoplo cats x2 sail fin plec x2 ,and a few on Americans , a Featherfin plecs X11 and some Jewel cichlids x2 . but recently I bit the bullet and bought / built a bank of 12 tanks in my workshop / shed, so far I've managed to breed bronze corydoras,guppy's ,molly's,bristle nosed plecs, convict cichlids ,neolamprogus bricardii, and got my angels to lay eggs ,( which they promptly ate ) I have a hill stream river tank with danios bull nosed plecs and butterfly loach with some White Cloud Mountain minnows and a few clown loach, and my latest fish are 6 Amazon puffers ,currently sharing a tank with some bristle nosed plecs and a shoal of neon tetras , I have a tank with some upside down cats which I rarely ever see. I'm still trying to get my set up just the way I want it and Am currently trying to convert all my "fish room " ( sounds very professional doesn't it ! ) ha ha . to Hamberg matten filters ,
I' struggling to identify/find a suitable high out put air pump to run 12 jet lift air pumps. I also want some extra capacity in the pump as I have 5 other tanks to set up in that room , any suggestions and links very much appreciated , any way I hope to learn from some of you folks and look forward to enjoying the forum ( it's a first for me as I'm a bit backwards in the tech media world )

 

[Colin_T]

Hi and welcome to the forum

I had a resun 20 I think but I ported it and doubled the air flow. I ran about 40 plastic multi-coloured airstones in 18 inches of water from the 1 pump after porting. The following link has resun air pump similar to what I used but a slightly bigger model.
https://www.ebay.com.au/i/152228048733?chn=ps

To port any air pump you turn it off and open it up. Then drill a couple of 10mm (or whatever size you can) holes in the case where the air is drawn in. This allows more air into the pump.
Then drill into the outlet pipe to make it slightly bigger. This allows more air out.
Look at the air chamber inside the pump and it usually has 1 little hole. You can usually make the hole bigger or add another hole or several more to allow air to flow thru the inside of the pump more efficiently.
Then reassemble and away you go.
Caution when doing this. Whilst the pump will run cooler and pump a lot more air, they are louder. So if this is in a bedroom or somewhere you want peace and quiet, do not port it

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The other thing to do is get 20mm poly pipe (black irrigation tube) and run it around the top of the fish room and join it together to make a loop. Join the pump to that. Then put taps into the black poly pipe and run air line down to the tanks. The loop provides more even air pressure all around and acts as a small reservoir.