what's wrong with RIO?

[KodiakBear]

I've searched through the product reviews and came up with nothing on rio. Yet, time and time again I see people bashing these pumps on other threads.
I'm getting ready to build a closed loop for my system, and the LFS only sells RIO (and sells them quite a bit cheaper than their 'after shipping' price online).
What really are the problems with RIO? I've been running my RIO 1700 as a sump return for about 2 months now without any problems (though two months is not really enough time to judge dependability). Are these problems so severe that I should just eat the added cost and get a quiet one or eheim?

[sasquatch]

I was tempted to get a rio, but my lfs said " they go thru shafts and impellers' so went with quiet ones instead

[KodiakBear]

What kind of shaft does the quiet ones have?

[Witfull]

older rio's gained a bad rap due to some serious issues. they would not start up after a power interupt which would result in overheating(no thermal protection) the motor and in some cases caused fires or leaking of cooling oil into tank. they also clogged very easily resulting in same as above. as more and more instances of these events became known, their reputation fell.

i for one will not use one,,,i saw my sump burning when a rio burned up after overheating.

[Travis]

Their poor reputation is based on their propensity to leak stray voltage into the water, and at times "melt down" inside the tank which can screw up the water quality.

Personally, I have been shocked by two rio pumps leaking voltage into the water. Both instances, Once I removed the rio pump the stray voltage was gone.

Don't think this is isolated to members here by the way... Here are some links to other sites on the web discussing these same issues:

reefs.org discussion board: Anyone ever have a RIO pump pollute their tank

By Steven Pro

Originally Posted by steven pro

I am just going to start off and say I am not fond of this brand of pump. On the plus side they are small, powerful, and inexpensive. On the negative side, my experience has shown these pumps to be unreliable and potentially dangerous. I have had a number simply fail to operate after just a year or two of service. Worse yet, I have also received mild shocks from a couple of these pumps. The potential for electrocution was the final straw. I systemically went through my customers’ tanks and replaced all the Rio pumps with comparable ones from other manufacturers. This was both a liability and cost-effectiveness issue. I can easily replace and bill a customer for a new pump while I am already there to perform a regularly scheduled cleaning, or I could have waited until they broke to replace them. This would necessitate a panicked call from a customer and a special trip. I no longer use any Rio pumps and I don’t recommend others use them for the reasons I outlined above.

I don’t want to give the impression that I have never had another brand of pump fail, I have. I also don’t want to say that all Rio pumps will eventually go bad. They are plenty of people that use them and never have problems. However, I have never had another brand of pump give me an electrical shock and I seem to have had a disproportionate number of this brand fail when compared to other brands I have used.

[boozeman]

[goldenmean]

I too have noticed some negativity directed towards RIO
I have 3 rio pumps in my nano tank.

I replaced the Rio 600 that powers my skimmer after 1 year.
It was still working but the skimmer was not working as efficently as it had been so I replaced it with another Rio600.

[sasquatch]

glad I avoided that! one less clunker in the closet of useless tank stuff

[goldenmean]

Man that was a lot of good info in just a few minutes!
RS rocks!

I will have to keep this in mind and keep a close eye on my RIOs.
I bet when I replace them I go to a different brand.

[KodiakBear]

Thanks for all the info. The reputation seems to be about 7 years old. Has rio fixed their problems and is now living with the reputation of past mistakes, or have they not changed since 2000 (the date on Travis' first link, didn't see a date on the pro article)? Was that about the time you were shocked by the leaking voltage, or was your incident more recent?

[Triggerjay]

I have a rio 2100 for the return for my fuge. It has seen about two years of use, and I had to replace the impeller ($18) to get the thing to quiet down. It got horribly noisy, and if I had to do it again, I would buy another brand, which I may just do anyways, and use the rio in the main display for circulation...

Jason

[MR PALM BEACH]

I ran I old rio 3100 and when I say old Is no ground prong, It was just a 2 prong plug. I must admit I never had a problem but after hearing different people say the same thing like travis said about the stray voltage I became very curious myself and got rid of It. And yes It was noise at times but then again I had sitting right on the bottom glass of my sump.

[bluespotjawfish]

This is quite interesting. I have had a Rio 2100 and Rio 600 on my tank for about 8 years without any issue and hardly any maintenance by me. The 2100 ran my old skimmer, and the 600 ran my old UV sterilizer. They both have the two prong plug. I DID HAVE TO REPLACE MY QUIET ONE PUMP AFTER ONLY A YEAR OF USE - IT (THE QUIET ONE PUMP) was never quiet and the motor gave out! I have a new Rio 1100 that I am running on my UV sterilizer. I have retired the other Rios, who don't owe me anything. They have outlasted every other pump I have had. I still have them and use them for temporary situations and to pump my mixed SW to my tank.

[BoomerD]

There have been 2 "grades" of Rio pumps over the years...those with UL listings, and those without UL listings...the ones WITH, have been fairly decent pumps, (although still subject to re-start issues) but the ones WITHOUT the UL listings are the ones known for frying in your tank and nuking the tank.
A good friend had a Rio 1700 in his tank just for flow...no head pressure against it...It fried in his tank, Melted and caught fire...IN THE WATER! I've contacted him to see if he still has the water testing results from that. (he works in a water testing lab) The copper content was pretty high as I remember, from the melted copper windings in the motor...

[boozeman]

now I've got that song by Duran Duran stuck in my head ''...her name is Rio and she dances on the sand''