Help me make up my mind...and spend some money.

[mcoomer]

I've got a 6' 180G that I upgraded to back in August. I've got a Reeflo Barracuda handling the return duties and two MP40W's. The vortechs are at each end of the tank, one blowing down the front of the tank and the other down the back. Not counting the return pump I figure the two powerheads are moving approximately 6,000gph at high speed. I want to do two things. I want to bump that number up and I want to create more turbulence with that flow.

To that end, I'm going to put two more pumps in my tank. I thought that I'd simply add two more vortechs but that's going to set me back better than $800. That would work, and it would work very well. Wife would kill me but the corals would be happy. I'm thinking that the way to go is a pair of Tunze 6125's. No, those pumps are not controllable but my plan is to set them so that they are each opposing one of the vortechs. Since the tunze is a constant speed pump I will ramp the vortechs up and down to change the flow in the water column. As the vortechs spin down the tunze will pump more water across the tank. As the vortechs spin up, resistance to waterflow will increase and the tunze won't be able to push as much water across the tank but with the pumps each putting out a lot of water there should be quite a bit of turbulent flow. At least that's the plan.

Will this work out? With all four pumps running at max I'll be moving approximately 12,000gph. That should be plenty of flow, and with the pumps opposing each other it should be pretty random and turbulent. Going the Tunze route will set back only half what the Vortechs would, and that will keep the boss happy. What do you think?

Mike

[geaux xman]

i like that idea.

do you have a RKE/Apex? can you have it cut on/off?

[Jstdv8]

just witht eh two powerheads you currently have you are getting 33 times turnover not counting your return pump.
Doubling that seems like massive overkill.

[mcoomer]

Originally Posted by geaux xman

i like that idea.

do you have a RKE/Apex? can you have it cut on/off?

Originally Posted by Jstdv8

just witht eh two powerheads you currently have you are getting 33 times turnover not counting your return pump.
Doubling that seems like massive overkill.

I do have an RKE and could control the pumps in that manner. If running all 4 turns out to be too much flow then I'll dial the vortechs back or use the RKE to turn the Tunzes off periodically. Running four pumps allows me to turn down the flow if I need to. With the two I have now there's nothing I can do if they're both running at max capacity.

Keep'em coming.

Mike