Battery Back up Air Pump

Ok so today hubby needed to make an emergency run home from work to start the generator for the fish tank. So that leads me to now ask what is a good battery back up air pump?

I was reading about this one ....Azoo Battery Backup Pump is there anything any better out there. I have a 29 biocube but will consider something bigger/better for the bigger fish tank that we all know will be coming down the road!!!

How long is a safe time frame that they can go with nothing running? 4 small fish/shrimp/ cleaner crew.

Thank you

 

Judy get a uninterruptable power supply and hook the whole tank up it

 

There are different version of the battery pumps. Look for one that plugs into a 120vAC wall plug and when it senses a loss of power comes on automatically such as this one.
Silent Air Battery Operated Air Pump - B11

With the others, if you are not home you can't install and start it up.

 

unless you have a very expensive UPS, hooking your whole tank up to it will drain it in minutes.

I have an APS ES 350 that I have one power head, my heater, and my ATO and auto doser plugged into. It'll run for a couple hours this way (I've tested it up to 4hrs, probably last longer). If I put my skimmer and/or lights on it, it goes out very fast (minutes).

Your tank can go several days with nothing running. I've lived through a few hurricanes and power outages w/o any major issue. My longest power outage was 4 days - I manually siphoned out water and dumped it back in for flow and aeration a few times a day starting on day 3.

Just running heater if needed and a single power head and an air pump off a battery pack will keep you going for several days. Unless you have an heat issue and need a chiller - but I don't have that issue in humid houston.

I have a generator nowadays, but wouldn't bother hooking my tank up to it till after two days personally.

 

+1 Kept my tank going for 2 weeks with a hand bicycle pump.(worked quite well actually). Hurricane Wilma.

 

Bicycle pump for two weeks? How'd you do that?

Here is my cheapo one that works pretty well and saved my tank once or twice so far:
http://www.3reef.com/forums/general...ered-air-pump-saved-my-fish-today-116690.html

 

Well, or you could learn to start the generator Just kidding, the air pumps are fine for short outages. Even the cheap ones, they last a long time. Just get a good airstone. Lime wood usually works best and they are also inexpensive.

 

: I would normally start the Generator but due to surgery a few weeks ago I can not pull it just yet....But I did get some nice tank presents for being down and out ;D
m2434 this is for you being a WISE GUY...

I really am most concerned for when we go away and if we should loose power my house sitter needs not to panic.

I will research the items listed above and see what will work best!

Thank you

 

It wasn't easy as I was totally unprepared.I took a the bike pump added the needle for pumping up Footballs/Basketballs and added some airline/airstone to it.I think I used a small hose clamp or some duct tape lol.I religiously went into the room and gave a few pumps every few hours.It was amazing the ammount of bubbles/air it would generate.Needless to say I purchased a generator soon after.
Good luck BioNemo.