What Powerhead Arrangement Works Best

[Forsaken77]

Hey all.... Got a quick question... My 180 with 180 pounds of CaribSea Liferock and 240 pounds of the pink CaribSea Arag-Alive sand needs powerhead placement suggestions. The tank is a dual overflow running stock Durso. It's a FOWLR tank (had to have my Harlequin Tusk fish).

My plan is to put an Ecotech MP-40 at each end facing each other. Would that be enough to keep detritus suspended throughout the tank just like that? Or should I add 2 cheaper, smaller powerheads to the back wall as well? I have 2 extra Sicce Xtremes that do 2,200 gph each and 2 extra Sicce Voyagers that do 1,600 each with an alternating controller. Plus I have 3 brand new Third Gen Koralia 2,200 pumps as well.

Eveytime I try to bounce water off the glass, I end up with diatoms where the water initially hits the glass and they spread along the entire pane. I'm trying to avoid that. But the Marineland 180 has those lower grates to suck water from lower levels of the tank and not just the top, which is actually what collects most of the detritus because it's lower in the tank.

Without corals to catch food particles, those lower grates help dramatically. But I've always had issues on powerhead placement.

Should the MP-40's powerheads be in front of the rockwork to flush in between the rocks when the water collides? Or should the power heads wash over the top of the rocks? Never had MP-40's before.

Fwiw, every time I have powerheads pointing directly on the rocks it seems to make diatoms grow like crazy on the rock, just like the glass, that gets the majority of the flow in my other 93 cube. At least I think it's Diatoms. It's just brown crud that covers the rocks but the Foxfaces eat it, so it must be Diatoms, dark brown.

Any suggestions are welcome

 

[jsker]

Its great to have multi power heads running in our systems. Myself I run two Gyre 130's on top and mp-40 two thirds down the middle and this move a lot of water around my scape and DT. A thing to look at, is what is causing your Diatoms. This is a good read, link Controlling the food source/nutrients that feed diatoms will be the key. As I stated, good water movement is a must in our systems, but until we control the food sources for a ugly algae outbreaks we will alway have algae in our systems. and blooms the cover rock, corals, and glass.

 

[Forsaken77]

I have tried everything with those diatoms. I have a single AI Prime lighting it, because it's a 30" x 30" tank with no coral and don't overfeed. I even tried a few weeks of every other day feeding, but some of the fish, like Red Coris Wrasse, are recommended to be fed 3x's a day. At present I feed once per day. Plus the adult Mag Foxface starts to nip at the tail of the smaller Foxface if it's every other day.

The only think I can think of is the sump is dirty. But the stand is second hand and not in the best shape and there's no way in hell I'm climbing under that tank to reach the back chambers. It's a custom sump and is pretty much the size of the stand. I have a bunch of pods on clean up duty down there.

The Po4 is 0 and No3 was 4 ppm. No Nitrites or Ammonia and I use a Spectrapure High Capacity Silica-Buster DI resin cartridge. Also seems now without Po4, when I add NoPox to lower the Nitrates the diatoms get worse.

 

[JimmyV]

I

I have tried everything with those diatoms. I have a single AI Prime lighting it, because it's a 30" x 30" tank with no coral and don't overfeed. I even tried a few weeks of every other day feeding, but some of the fish, like Red Coris Wrasse, are recommended to be fed 3x's a day. At present I feed once per day. Plus the adult Mag Foxface starts to nip at the tail of the smaller Foxface if it's every other day.

The only think I can think of is the sump is dirty. But the stand is second hand and not in the best shape and there's no way in hell I'm climbing under that tank to reach the back chambers. It's a custom sump and is pretty much the size of the stand. I have a bunch of pods on clean up duty down there.

The Po4 is 0 and No3 was 4 ppm. No Nitrites or Ammonia and I use a Spectrapure High Capacity Silica-Buster DI resin cartridge. Also seems now without Po4, when I add NoPox to lower the Nitrates the diatoms get worse.

Is there at way you can clean your sump without climbing in there, maybe use a shop vac to reach in to get the dirt out just in the areas the pods aren't in the most.
Isn't nopox a form of carbon dosing, and do you start and stop that.
When I started dosing vodka I had diatom blooms until the system caught up and the nitrate was down.

 

[Forsaken77]

I


Is there at way you can clean your sump without climbing in there, maybe use a shop vac to reach in to get the dirt out just in the areas the pods aren't in the most.
Isn't nopox a form of carbon dosing, and do you start and stop that.
When I started dosing vodka I had diatom blooms until the system caught up and the nitrate was down.

Yes, NoPox is carbon dosing. I started for a little bit, the diatoms and algae would get worse, so I'd stop.

 

[mjlash22]

Hey all.... Got a quick question... My 180 with 180 pounds of CaribSea Liferock and 240 pounds of the pink CaribSea Arag-Alive sand needs powerhead placement suggestions. The tank is a dual overflow running stock Durso. It's a FOWLR tank (had to have my Harlequin Tusk fish).

My plan is to put an Ecotech MP-40 at each end facing each other. Would that be enough to keep detritus suspended throughout the tank just like that? Or should I add 2 cheaper, smaller powerheads to the back wall as well? I have 2 extra Sicce Xtremes that do 2,200 gph each and 2 extra Sicce Voyagers that do 1,600 each with an alternating controller. Plus I have 3 brand new Third Gen Koralia 2,200 pumps as well.

Eveytime I try to bounce water off the glass, I end up with diatoms where the water initially hits the glass and they spread along the entire pane. I'm trying to avoid that. But the Marineland 180 has those lower grates to suck water from lower levels of the tank and not just the top, which is actually what collects most of the detritus because it's lower in the tank.

Without corals to catch food particles, those lower grates help dramatically. But I've always had issues on powerhead placement.

Should the MP-40's powerheads be in front of the rockwork to flush in between the rocks when the water collides? Or should the power heads wash over the top of the rocks? Never had MP-40's before.

Fwiw, every time I have powerheads pointing directly on the rocks it seems to make diatoms grow like crazy on the rock, just like the glass, that gets the majority of the flow in my other 93 cube. At least I think it's Diatoms. It's just brown crud that covers the rocks but the Foxfaces eat it, so it must be Diatoms, dark brown.

Any suggestions are welcome

I have a 5' tank with 2 MP40's, one on each side. I have mine about 1/3 the way down from the top water line. Im using reef crest anti sync at about 50% and have been happy so far. I do not have any build up of detritus. Water movement seems good, though I do not currently have corals in the tank.

I


Is there at way you can clean your sump without climbing in there, maybe use a shop vac to reach in to get the dirt out just in the areas the pods aren't in the most.
Isn't nopox a form of carbon dosing, and do you start and stop that.
When I started dosing vodka I had diatom blooms until the system caught up and the nitrate was down.

I have used NoPox for about a year now on two different tanks and have had great results with algae control. Key is to hone in the dose so that you don't completely zero everything out. My last water check was 0 Phos and 5-10 nitrate.