Cleaning a HoB Filter

[Trillianne]

There is exactly one part of the AC filter I have that I detest, and its for the simple matter of how to keep it clean.

Its the top U shaped piece on the intake tube.

Every so often the thing gets gross and covered with brown algae, at which point the only solution I've found is to soak it for several hours in bleach solution then in de-chlor solution to knock out the bleach.

Does anyone have a better way? Any tool that perhaps I'm unfamiliar with?

[genocidex]

well i use a pipe cleaner type thing that i had around.... it works fine and easy lol

or you could thread some fishing line threw it then use the fishing line to pull some paper towel threw.

[Hardy85]

If you are talking about the inside of the pipe, what about a flexible version of one of these

http://www.amazon.com/pipe-cleaning-.../dp/B00078N8UY

I twist a small towel through my filter tubes to clean them and it works well

[genocidex]

this wont work for ac 70+110 but for the others this should be fine....

http://www.amazon.com/Allen-Company-...n+cleaning+kit

[Goes to 11!]

Does anyone have a better way?

Change how you think about it, I do not care at all about that as long as the flow is not interrupted. It is surprisingly effortless.

I actually had to go check mine & only one out of four has any?[Shows how much attention I pay eh?]

[Taurus]

There is exactly one part of the AC filter I have that I detest, and its for the simple matter of how to keep it clean.

Its the top U shaped piece on the intake tube.

Every so often the thing gets gross and covered with brown algae, at which point the only solution I've found is to soak it for several hours in bleach solution then in de-chlor solution to knock out the bleach.

Does anyone have a better way? Any tool that perhaps I'm unfamiliar with?

Several hours?? It shouldn't take that long to clear brown algae with a water\bleach solution. It' more like 5 minutes.

[Trillianne]

Ok several hours may be overstating the timeframe, but I tend to let it get pretty hideous before I do anything about it... meanwhile it turns me into a bit of a crab.

Mostly its one of those things where you try to ignore it for as long as possible... then get really mad because you are getting a bout of increased algae in other areas so you want to tackle it and... yeah.

[Taurus]

Ok several hours may be overstating the timeframe, but I tend to let it get pretty hideous before I do anything about it...

Don't do that. Dip it in a weak water\bleach solution ever couple of weeks, rinse it with tap water, then soak it in dechlorinated water. Simple as pie.

[KevinVA]

I take more of an 850r approach. I typically ignore it, but if it gets nasty, I'll just swish it around in tank water. Though it never gets that bad, I suppose.

[Trillianne]

Swishing in tank water would do nothing, I can run full bore tap faucet water through the thing and it still looks terrible.

I guess I just have to suck this one up as far as the cleaning requirements go.