QO 3000 Mod

I was tinkering around the garage yesterday and came across my old bucket of bio balls.
They gave me an idea to try and make a needle wheel out of one. I had a Quiet One 3000 laying around and it looked like it would be easy to mod.
So I went to work on it and heres how it turned out.

The ball shaved down and mounted.

The modded intake.


Final assembly.

 

Ya it starts a little sluggish, but then takes off.

I just set it in my 30g to see what it would do. The farther down in the tank the harder it is to start. But I tried hooking it up to a small air pump and it filled my 30g in about 20sec flat.

Not sure what the scfh is, so I ordered a flow meter to find out what it'll pull.

 

I've made some changes to it to help the start up problem, I'll post some more pics as I get a chance.

 

Here are the changes that I made to the needle wheel. It starts at the bottom of my 30g no problems so it should be ok as my recirculating pump for my skimmer. 
Old mod!

New mod!


Still retains all the needles but is about 1/2 as thick.