Tank flow question?

[Dmat21]

Hey guys newbie here
I was wondering if I could go bigger return pump and no power heads in my 65 gallon Marine aquarium?
I went with a controllable DC pump rated for 800gph.
could thi pull off what want to do? “ No powerhead for movement“
I do believe my tank has two return nozzles

 

[EmdeReef]

If it's a fish only tank, then it could work out. Note that there are some limitations to how much flow your plumbing may be able to support. 800gph is the max your pump is rated for, the actual output will likely be much less than that, and will slow down over time as the pump and plumbing get dirty.
If you plan to keep SPS corals and some more demanding LPS then this would not work. Always good to keep as much flow as you can and not rely on only your return pump for flow though.

 

[Dmat21]

Thanks Brother!

 

[R.Weller]

I would avoid any single points of failure. When using one return pump, with all of your life support in the sump, is an accident waiting to happen. I've experienced it & when we upgraded, it was something we designed-out in our planning. So for example, instead of one return pump @ 100%, we have two at 35%. We now use x4 heaters vs. 1 large heater & 3 of them are plugged into a temp controller with one running on the internal thermostat.

 

[jim_fitz]

personlly i wouldnt as i think you need quite a long retention time in your sump for the filtration to work adequately
plus as mentioned if your one pumps fails you will potentially deplete oxygen levels and this can be catastrophic for your fish

 

[jda]

This will work better if you put the return on some sort of rotating device like a Sea Swirl. Also, as said above, best to have a pump in the tank in case the return fails - at least this way, the fish can still breathe. Even a MaxiJet 1200 will work for this either with the impeller or propeller.

 

[Pyrosteve]

I tried it with a tank half your size and it didn't work too well. I got a Jebao DCQ 3500 (924 gph) with 2 Hydor Spinning deflectors. The deflectors couldn't handle the flow I wanted and even without them, to get some good flow in the tank it made my small sump roarin' rapids. The DCQ also has a wave feature I thought would be a good idea but I didn't consider it would make a wave in the sump also. Pretty much a fail all around. I added a Jebao Gyre type CP-90 and have a SLW-20 on the way.