So I was at the Dollar Tree (for the people that don't know it's a store that everything is a $1 or less) yesterday and I came across this...




They are a nut and bolt set with the nuts and bolts separated with screw together plastic containers. Having had several cannister filters over the years these some what resembled some of the filter media baskets I have used and something clicked!  :hmmm: I have been trying to figure out something for my 55g as I wanted to up my filtration a bit and I really didn't want to spend much money in doing so and my option was to pick up an HOB or add another cannister... Well I had an extra Aqua clear 30 power head...I picked up two of them. When I got home I  broke out the Dremel (I don't even bother to put it away any more I just keep it in my stash spot in my desk in the fish room still plugged in  :hihi:)

So to begin I removed the sticker from the lid, this proved to be a major PITA and I ended up using a wire brush bit in my Dremel to get all the adhesive off it...



Then I swiss cheesed all the baskets with the Dremel like this...



I added some PTFE/ Plumbers tape to the threads just for extra sealing of the threads. Here is how I attached the power head to the lid. The hole was snug but for good measure I added a small piece of rubber hosing to use as like a retaining clip. I did have to trim the flow adjustment arm down to get it to sit as flush as possible to the lid.



Then I cut a piece of open cell foam I had laying around from another project and put it into the first basket.





Second media basket is seasoned (has bacteria from being in another filter)  small lava rock. Third basket is most open cell foam that is seasoned as well and cut into small cubes. Four and final is filter floss to polish the water. I added a piece of swiss cheesed 3/4" clear tubing to keep the filter floss out of the strainer of the power head.





Then I added a spray bar to the outlet to control the direction of flow better. Here it is all put together. I forgot to take a picture of it in the tank working. To give you a perspective of the overall size the spray bar is 6" and baskets are 3 1/2 - 4" around and about 1 3/4 - 2" tall , inside of basket is about 1 1/4 - 1 1/2" for media as the threaded sections are about 1/4 " .



It works great and the flow is great ! I had to bore out of spray bar holes a bit as it had too much back pressure and I was getting flow out the venturi hole. The only thing I would do differently would be to spray some black Krylon Fusion Plastic spray paint on the baskets so it didn't stick out so much (it will have black background soon )  but I was in a hurry to see if it would work and forgot to pick some up. I will build another one and paint it as I need to get this tank put together better, the scape is driving me crazy! Basically it's a in tank power head driven cannister filter. A bit bulky and ugly as is but functional and cheap.

That looks awesome Jubs and it's great that it works too. ;D

Thanks R@ndom  :) I'm brain storming how to hide it now  :hihi:

did you do anything on the threads to prevent leaking?

Yeah I added some plumber's tape to them.

How did you get flow through the media.  The power head is providing suction at the top, but is there a hole at the bottom somewhere to support forcing the water through the media?

:13: all the trays are drilled at the bottom.

In the tank running. Still has great flow and is cleaning up the dead plant matter floating around, you can't see it but the intake basket bottom is getting a nice collection going. If you look at the surface of the water you can see the agitation of the water ( I aimed it at the glass as I have floating plants in the tank and I don't like them getting bunched up from the flows of the filters so I aim them at the glass to help with this).

where's the water inlet?

Under the bottom basket.