# Eheim Ecco Failure -- Lid Popped Off!



## tomheo (May 20, 2008)

Hi,

I was getting ready for bed tonight when I heard a loud pop and the sound of running water. For some reason, I at first thought it was the ice maker for my refrigerator, but then quickly realized it was from my tank! I thought it might be a loose connection for the feed pump to my chiller, but it was from my Eheim Ecco Canister filter! I quickly shut off all power and closed as many valves as I could find since I was in a slight state of panic. 

I at first thought one of the connections had gone bad, but I saw that the top had popped off! After taking it to the sink, I realized the hinge where the handle attaches to the body just snapped off, causing the top to come off. Keep in mind my tank's only been running for around 2 months and I hadn't touched the filters since set-up (so it wasn't from me not putting the top back on correctly).

Has anyone heard of this happening before? I'm sooo relieved it happened while I was at home...if it had happened while I wasn't around, it probably would have drained most of my tank! Luckily I had my filters in a tray (for drips when cleaning filters) and I caught it fast enough that I only lost about 3 or 4 gallons, but I'm still a little frazzled.

I think it's my fault for having the filter in series with an Eheim 2217 and that the little Ecco couldn't take all the pressure? Shoot, just last week I was thinking I should take the Ecco off and use it as a carbon reactor for my new reef tank, too....

Anyways, does anyone know how to get in touch with Eheim? I tried their website and couldn't find contact info for them....

I also wanted to give aheads up to people...I don't think I'll go with another Ecco even though I love the priming and all that.... Looking at the hinge that broke, it's surprising how flimsy it is....

Thanks,
Thomas


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## Squawkbert (Jan 3, 2007)

Oh yeah - 2217 is a BEAST - Waaaaay more flow than an Ecco, and they're designed to run under negative pressure (at least Classics are) so that if you nick an o-ring, you won't notice unless you hear air going in or you have a long power outage and it starts to seep.

You were over feeding the Ecco and forcing it to run under positive pressure.
Had you switched them up, the 2217 would have probably been prone to cavitation as the Ecco wouldn't have supplied it w/ enough flow.

Best bet is to run them independently and hide the extra spray bars etc. as best as you can.


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## rich815 (Jun 27, 2007)

>>>>I think it's my fault for having the filter in series with an Eheim 2217 

So the Ecco was "in line" between the 2217 output and the tank? Why?


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## tomheo (May 20, 2008)

rich815 said:


> >>>>I think it's my fault for having the filter in series with an Eheim 2217
> 
> So the Ecco was "in line" between the 2217 output and the tank? Why?


Why is 'cause of my stupidity.  Actually, it's kind of a long story, but basically, I bought equipment thinking I'd do an ADA 60p (~20g), and then mid-stream, I decided to get the 75p (~40g) instead. The Ecco was too underpowered for the new tank, so I decided to get a bigger filter, but it was too late to return the Ecco. Then, I started reading all these threads about it being better to have two filters rather than one (for redundancy), but I didn't want too many pipes in the tank. I then read about people using canisters inline / in series. I had no idea that something like this could happen though. I'm just going to run the tank with one filter though, just to keep things simple, which is what I should've done in the first place.

Thomas


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