My only comment here is why would you consider a prefilter a 'pain' since
without the prefilter the PUMP would get gummed up internally and either
run
very inefficiently (ie: use much more power) or just DIE from to much
strain
on it.

Our system had two fairly large filter baskets with (what seemed to me)
pretty density filter material. It worked fine at first, but soon started
cloggling. It was a bit of a chore to pull out and clean, and after that
would only work for a couple of weeks before needing it again. That got old
really quick!

When we purchased those we were told that once things were in "balance,"
organisms in the filtered material would break it down and keep the water
flowing (without much maintenance on our part) but for some reason we never
were able to reach that magical balance point. Being new to this, I'm sure
we were doing a lot of things wrong.

Based on the responses here, it sounds like we could have just replaced the
filter material with something less dense. Unfortanatly, the pump died also
(Danner mag drive). So since we having to replace this, we were thinking of
trying one like the Oase Aquamax or Cyprio Titan which can pump fairly
largle particulates (6 to 8 mm) and don't really require any filtering other
than their screened housings. Presumably this means less maintenance - at
least that's what we've heard. I was hoping someone who's used one or the
other could confirm this.

Thanks for the reply. -Pat


If it clogs to quickly, put a larger prefilter on it or find a way to get
to
the prefilter that isn't as much a pain to access.

james, seattle