Best/Quietest air pumps? -Anyone compared the best brands?

[British_Bulldog]

Hi there,

I'm interested in what's the quietest air pump, and am wondering if anyone's compared the best brands? If so, which was the best/quietest?

Many people online say "yeah I've got this pump, 'xyz', and it's really quiet", then other people say that pump is loud, etc, so it's fairly subjective, but let's say the pump was put on a surface which didn't transmit sound/vibration, like spongy foam, or was hung up, which would be the quietest?

I'm also interested in good performance - a nice strong flow of air.
These are what I've seen - can anyone who's tried them all/most of them please give a recommendation:


- Eheim

- Tetratec AP Whisper

- Interpet AirVOLUTION

- Rena



Many thanks,

Peace

 

[ChaosCatalunya]

Hi BB,

If you must use an air pump, hang it from bungee cord... this isolates it more than any foam base imo.

If you have a nice powerful pump, with a bit of poke to spare, just tap in to the feed pipe above the water surface with a T piece, then an L and finally a Tap, point tap end down at res surface and adjust the gush effect to suit... leaving enough to carry on past and be fed in the top of the trays as usual. If you want to go real fancy, you could fit a homemade spraybar beyond the tap end to maximise oxygenation. All done for pennies, one less thing to go wrong.

 

[FreezerBoy]

All I can say is the "Whisper" brand pumps are poorly named.

 

[ThePizzaMan]

The whisper air pumps at Walmart are really not that bad. You cannot hear them unless you put your head to them.

 

[British_Bulldog]

Hi and thanks for the comments,

I had some of the old black box-shaped Tetratec Whisper pumps before, and thought they were ok but I put a large dual-outlet one in a homemade acoustic box (shoe box with foam inside).

Frank - did u try the new Whisper pumps or the old ones?


Peace

 

[ak-51]

I have several of the Tetra Whisper 30-60 air pumps from wal-mart. They are sufficiently quiet everywhere except for where you might sleep. I have a couple in a closet in my bedroom and I close it when I'm sleeping in order to dampen the sound. Not that it would keep me awake, but it would be annoying if the door weren't closed.

I should mention that I think the output is varied between each unit (all the same model). Some vibrate harder than others, and some are louder than others. I would still recommend them, but if you get three and one of them is significantly less powerful then I wouldn't be shy about taking it back.

I also had one (seemingly) die on me. I touch each one individually every day to make sure they're still working, and this one wasn't moving at all. So I swapped it out (I'm all over the redundancy game) and set it aside. A few days or so later I plugged it back in and it started pumping away again.

Conclusion: Recommend with reservations. Costerformance ratio good.

 

[FreezerBoy]

The whisper air pumps at Walmart are really not that bad. You cannot hear them unless you put your head to them.

I can hear mine throughout the house. They're not screamers but, there's nothing whisperish about them.

 

[Clackamas Coot]

You might want to check out MarineDepot.com and look at their product lines.

HTH

CC

 

[British_Bulldog]

I ended up recommending the Eheim 3702 and 3704 to my friend - top quality and very quiet. Better than the old Tetratec 'Whispers' I had and milessss better than the cheap Chinese pumps you find.

Peace