View Full Version : water movement questions
I am setting up a new 75g reef (some small fish and soft corals) and will have 2 inch dsb along with 150 lbs live rock *from Tampa Bay Saltwater* will have a Aqua remora pro protein skimmer hob and mh lights 2 x 150w. My question is about power jet/pumps for putting in the aquarium to move the water. I thought about 2 x 1200 maxi jets as they are submersible......any comments ????? Thanks!
Crown Royal
12-19-2005, 8:27 PM
By definition, 2 inches of sand cannot be a "deep sand bed". You need at least twice that to achieve the necessary nitrification processes that a DSB can eventually achieve.
Maxijets are very reliable and economical water movers. However, for a 75 gallon you're asking alot for two 1200s to provide enough flow by themselves. Then again, for softies, which like low flow, your probably OK.
You can do a neat little mod to greatly increase the flow rate on Maxijets by sawing of the nozzle and drilling a few extra holes around the intake. I've got two modded 1200s on my 46 bowfront and the flow is quite good.
wastememphis
12-19-2005, 11:27 PM
Do you have any pictures of your mod on them? I've seen some where people made it into a tunze style monting and it drastically increased the flow... how much more water does it push?
Your setup sounds good, should be a nice tank... thats alot of live rock! I have 4 maxijet 1200's and two seio 1100's in my 65gallon tank. I really like the two seios and would recomend those if you wanted to only buy two power heads. They are alot more gph (1100 compared to the 295comming out of the maxi jet) but the output is 3" compared to the size of a pen so the seio pumps feel about the same, to the touch, but are actually a more spread out current.
Neil.
Crown Royal
12-20-2005, 2:04 AM
Some pics of the maxijet mod (go to his Oct. 15 entry):
http://www.melevsreef.com/archives/2005_10_01_archive.html
The difference (at least according to my hand) is quite dramatic. The neat thing is that it's actually random which way the impeller spins upon start-up. With the nozzle cut off the flow can come out in two directions. So if you put it on a wavemaking powerstrip, you'll have a built-in wave deflector as well!
Seio's are a great alternative. Less focussed flow and much less of the poor reputation that the Rios have.
Okay so I should change the pumps to SEIO 850gph. Where should I place them to obtain optimal water movement? Should they be directed at each other? Also with the sand I was going to use 3" of play sand topped with 2" of live sand?
Input is greatly appreciated......
Crown Royal
12-20-2005, 6:02 PM
In an ideal world, you'd get a couple of Tunze 6100's and a Multicontroller - but spending close to four figures is most likely out of your budget . . .
Seio pros: moves more water in a greater area (although with the nozzle mod on the Maxijet this advantage is lessened a bit)
Maxijet pros: somewhat cheaper, takes up less space in the tank, uses less electricity (therefore generates less heat), seem to do better on wavemakers than Seios which sometimes have trouble starting up again.
The most important thing from corals point of view is water flow. The choice is yours.
The standard placement is one at either side of the tank towards the back pointed not directly at each other, but at the same spot (usually the centre front of the tank) - so that the two flows collide and create random currents throughout the tank.
I wouldn't bother with "live sand". Cheapo playsand will become "live" anyway by itself in a few months from the live rock. You should also be careful about mixing different types of sand. Overtime, the smaller grains will work their way down to the bottom eventually creating two separate zones. This will affect nitrification processes and may disrupt the operation of the DSB.