Unless they do eventually start again on their own? I've never left it long enough to figure out.

Anyone else have experience with this filter?

 

I don't have the same filter but I do have the same problem. It's a marineland filter with the bio wheel and it drves me mad whenever I have had to turn it off for whatever reason. My other two tanks have different filters and never have done this. I am wondering why this happens so I can either fix it or ditch it before I go on vacation. It's scary to think about the fact that I have to trust that fiter 1 week every month from May to October because my fish sitter wouldn't be there enough to catch it before the cycle gets destroyed :/

 

I think you should just buy another filter and have them both running at the same time... I know how you feel when I went on spring break I didn't remember to plug the filter back in after a water change so my boy got fin rot even though my mom had plugged it in 3 days after I left... he has finally healed and is back to normal again!

 

I'd just buy a new filter. I got the same tank kit at walmart and planned on buying a new filter for it anyway. It worked out cheaper to buy the walmart kit and upgrade the filter.

 

If it was me, I'd either switch over to a sponge filter, or use a sponge filter as a backup to your regular filter.

I've had well-sponged HOB's for the last year and a half, and about two weeks ago I switched over one of my tanks to a sponge...and I've already started the process to switch over the rest as well. Twice I've had the sponges come off the outflow and totally stress out two of my fish. They're so much gentler, and I like the fact that they are putting a lot more oxygen into the water. Even my most filter-current-hating guys have had no problems at all with the sponge filters. (And they're absolutely safe, they cannot get hurt on them.)

Also, super cheap. For about 10$ you can get a *good* sponge filter. You'd spend at least double that for a good HOB filter.
I'd definitely recommend.

 

That filter is a pain. I have two sitting in the boxes now. You could keep running it if it's generally working out. What I did see a suggested in article of power outages is that you keep a sponge filter in the tank w/o running it (you need to squeeze it on tank cleaning day) and have an air pump handy with a battery backup. The theory being that an air pump takes less power to run. I need to look into battery backup myself as we seem to have frequent power outages in the summer. I've seen them sold at Jack's but I'm sure they'd be cheaper online.

 

I only have one tank with an HOB - everything else I use sponge filters on. I personally recommend going with a sponge filter for your peace of mind To clean it, just swish/squeeze it in tank water you removed during a water change and place it back in. Only ever needs to be replaced if it starts to fall apart - but that can take a very long time.

 

I would second to the suggestion to just buy a new filter. I like the Tetra Whisper
filters that they also sell at Walmart. I am running three of these now, one in the 5 gallon it came with and two more in a divided ten gallon that I just set up tonight. There is nothing to these... they just plug-in and go. Also, we lost power the other night when a car hit a transformer couple of blocks away from the house and there was no issue at all with it starting right back up again. It's about as easy as it it gets, and it truly is silent which I like.

On another note I now have two brand-new filters that come with the 10 gallon Walmart kits that I am not going to use and I am looking to find someone to take them off my hands. PM me if interested.

 

I have a "Deepblue Biomaxx 10 Power Filter".(rated for up to ten gallons) for a smaller shrimp tank. High quality and silent. I then added a slip on "Fluval Edge Pre Filter" to the intake Cylindrical Sponge.

 

Alrighty, PetSmart's 10 gallon kit comes with the Tetra Whisper so I'll probably just buy those from now on.