Hiding Pump Wires INSIDE Your Tank? I HATE wires!

[Mark Gray]

Paint the back of the tank black and they will blend in

 

[Breadman03]

On RC, @slief had some pictures up of his Tunze pumps. He attached them on his old closed loop outlets and ran the wires through the old plumbing.

 

[jlanger]

Now if I could only make my cords inside the stand be less visible; that’s a challenge I haven’t yet attacked.

 

[jlanger]

I’m definitely not a fan of cords in my tank, over my tank or above my tank, so I designed my system so that visible cords are kept to a bare minimum.
I have four MP40’s for water movement. I like what I see from the Gyres, but until they can eliminate the cord in the tank, they’re not in my tank.
To eliminate seeing any power cords from my lighting systems, I installed an electrical outlet in the soffit above the tank. It’s great to not see any cords between my floating canopy and the tank.

 

[Sir Chris]

This is so weird cause I’ve been debating on a rimless but that requires 0 wires and clean clean clean. Wanted a cube nano but for the items it’s more then the tank so y not go larger with rimless when it’s a 340$ mp4s or the new mag mounted powerheads and 4 of em, tank is 700$ so ur over with powerheads alone...

 

[CoralNerd]

I wish there was a pump like Vortech but the pump head had the ability to point in the direction you want. I added some Tunze 6095's and being able to point the pump head upward works best in my tank but now I'm stuck with wires [emoji58]

 

[Breadman03]

I wish there was a pump like Vortech but the pump head had the ability to point in the direction you want. I added some Tunze 6095's and being able to point the pump head upward works best in my tank but now I'm stuck with wires [emoji58]

Hmmm. It's not within my skillset, but one could DIY something. You know how the Tunzes have the guard that slips over the outlet? One could make something similar for the MP but with angled slats. 3D printer, anyone?

 

[Luno]

Won't help for an established tank but with a bit of clever thinking I could see a new tank be made with external wave boxes or closed loop piping and pumps.

 

[revhtree Verified Admin]

Thanks for the comments!

 

[jose hernandez]

vortechs 4 sure much nicer easy maintenance 2

 

[don_chuwish]

With a black background and the Tunze 6055s mounted up pretty high they aren't even really seen. BUT I still hate that the wires have to go over the edge. Had to cut a notch in the frame of my screen top and they always seem to interfere with aiming the flow.

 

[Daniel@R2R Verified Admin]

I'd love to see a really good solution. At this point, I just stick with vortechs

 

[CoralNerd]

I'd love to see a really good solution. At this point, I just stick with vortechs

You mean @Rakie hasn't convinced you the Vortechs are too one directional. No ability to point the pump where you want sucks as they can easily blast your corals.

 

[Daniel@R2R Verified Admin]

You mean @Rakie hasn't convinced you the Vortechs are too one directional. No ability to point the pump where you want sucks as they can easily blast your corals.

Not where I have mine positioned ;Stig

 

[slief]

On RC, @slief had some pictures up of his Tunze pumps. He attached them on his old closed loop outlets and ran the wires through the old plumbing.

Yea, I like to mount mine through bulkheads whether it was on the back of my tank or on customers tanks through the wall on the overflow. The older Tunze's that I used on my tank required the wires to be desoldered from the little interface box. The newer Tunze's with the built in controller have a nice little plug on them that can easily be removed from the Tunze controller if you open the box up.When it comes time for cleaning them, I just pull the pumps out of the tank and pull some cable through the pipe and do the cleaning on top of the tank in a pot with vinegar and a scrub brush.

These ones were used in a customers tank where they were mounted to bulkheads on the overflow. The wires came out the top of the overflow above the tank. You can see plug that goes into the Tunze controller box.

These were on my tank and mounted to existing bulkheads on the rear of the tank where my old closed loop pumps were.

Some more pictures of the ones I did for a customer. I used nylon screws and nuts to mount the Tunze silence base to the PVC pipe.

This is how the wires come out the back of my display. The old closed loop pipes were cut and the bulkheads were rotated upwards with just enough pipe left to extend above the water line where the wires come of of the back of the tank. This entire retrofit from closed loop to Tunze was done while the tank was fully stocked. I have used this method on other custom installs and have used this same method to mount Tunze's to overflows on customers tanks as well.

 

[revhtree Verified Admin]

Yea, I like to mount mine through bulkheads whether it was on the back of my tank or on customers tanks through the wall on the overflow. The older Tunze's that I used on my tank required the wires to be desoldered from the little interface box. The newer Tunze's with the built in controller have a nice little plug on them that can easily be removed from the Tunze controller if you open the box up.When it comes time for cleaning them, I just pull the pumps out of the tank and pull some cable through the pipe and do the cleaning on top of the tank in a pot with vinegar and a scrub brush.

These ones were used in a customers tank where they were mounted to bulkheads on the overflow. The wires came out the top of the overflow above the tank. You can see plug that goes into the Tunze controller box.

These were on my tank and mounted to existing bulkheads on the rear of the tank where my old closed loop pumps were.

Some more pictures of the ones I did for a customer. I used nylon screws and nuts to mount the Tunze silence base to the PVC pipe.

This is how the wires come out the back of my display. The old closed loop pipes were cut and the bulkheads were rotated upwards with just enough pipe left to extend above the water line where the wires come of of the back of the tank. This entire retrofit from closed loop to Tunze was done while the tank was fully stocked. I have used this method on other custom installs and have used this same method to mount Tunze's to overflows on customers tanks as well.

Very very cool!

 

[Susan Edwards]

I hate wires showing in the tank and the only way I could figure out how to get around that issue is for the main flow to be created with a closed loop.
I also use Mp-40's for problem areas.
I've seen a few people try to say that closed loops are out of style or obsolete, but it sure beats loading a tank up with pumps with wires in the water.

what is a closed loop

 

[doughboy]

I use VCA RFG on my 50gal (not closed loop). no powerheads, no wires.
if you run a closed loop, RFG is perfect. any regular (dc) pump will work with RFG to create random flow. no need to use vectra pump to create random flow in closed loop.

 

[themcfreak]

I use Vortech's so no wires there. My issues is that I wanted to know what my PAR was, so I ordered a PMK from Neptune (since I already had APEX, it made sense to order into what I already have). My dilemma is that I spent the money on it, so I want to use it, but it has a wire that has to go all the way to the sand bed if I want to leave it in there. Currently have a top-to-bottom overflow, so its tucked as close to that as I can, but in my new tank coming (thread in the signature) I have a ghost overflow, so won't be able to do that anymore. I'm thinking of just testing PAR periodically and leaving sensor out of tank, but I like having the data (even if it isn't used on a regular basis, since there aren't changes happen). So @Terence what about a wireless PMK sensor? hahaha

 

[CoralNerd]

When you get larger sps colonies you need way more flow. I run 4 VCA nozzles on 2 DC 10000 pumps, 3 Tunze 6095 and a Mp40. [emoji6]