water movement?

[daytonaconnecti]

should i get two phs to move water onto my lr, or get a bigger external pump to run my scwd and more loc-line fittings, they make a loc - line fiting that will go around the rim of my tank at the top to help hide it,it will let me put different nozzles or tips, where they are neded along the rim blowing on the lr, iam using a 800 gph now to move water,from side to side...

 

[Krish]

And were off!(LOL) I like the external pump idea and if I didn't mind all of the plumbing in the tank with a glass setup, I would have done it myself. I'd get more feedback on the scwd though. I've heard the thing reduces flow by 50%! The lockline fittings are awesome as well. You can point them exactly where you want. As you know, I've got the Tunzes as well as the sea-swirl. I thought about adding another Tunze, but it would make things seem too crowded. Nevertheless, they rock as well! I guess it would be totally up to what you like and don't mind seeing. If you have a few bucks you feel like burning up, you may want to look into the Ocean motions

 

[daytonaconnecti]

thanks....

 

[wrightme43]

one thing about locline, if its exposed to air it usually sucks in micro bubbles.

 

[bpiermat]

Does anybody have experiance drilling an Acrylic Tank when it is full or half full?

 

[daytonaconnecti]

this is an old pic,with the addition of a remora skimmer, and the absents of the skilter tank lr is in the same place, need some advice on water movement if you had this setup, what would you think would be the best way to get the best flow over the rocks.... http://www.reeffrontiers.com/forums/attachment.php?attachmentid=9025&d=1134221548

 

[rainier29]

I love the scwd. Never had any problems with mine and I did ream out the fittings to 1/2 inch. They do reduce the flow substantially but that can be overcome by a larger pump and opening up the ports on the scwd.

 

[daytonaconnecti]

iam useing a scwd now to move water flow down and to the front, trying to decide of a good ph placement, to start off with, i know its not just plug and play with this hobby....or if its best to use a pump and loc-line fittings to help with the job...

 

[Krish]

Daytonabill...I figure I would try a single powerful powerhead, it may be all you will need to add in there. Your tank isn't rectangular, it's a hexagon, which means you have walls all around that can deflect water and divert water everywhere. That's almost like putting a powerhead in a bucket (for eg) The water just swirls around and around. Just a thought...

 

[daytonaconnecti]

uits shaped like a diamond, by the above pic whats the best place to put it for starters....if i go power head, iam just not sure whats best, with out trial and error, i just need advice on what will be my best choice on water movement ph or loc-lines,, maybe like you said one strong ph bouncing water around, also a good pump and loc-lines will do the same, trying to save time and money

 

[Krish]

Well, the problem which I have in my tank with adding more flow, is placement. When adding so many different sources of flow (eg multiple ph, nozzles etc.) some can pretty much cause more of a problem than help the situation. If you have one flow source colliding with another, it becomes pointless IMO. I guess you will have to look at your tank now (maybe throw a flake or two in there or something) and observe where the flow takes it. Also, just by looking at what comes off of your rocks when you take a ph to it, will tell you which areas need the extra attention. That way, you can determine where you need the extra gph of flow and where it would need to come from. A powerhead may do the trick and then again, some locline may be the ticket. As for me (just as an example) nothing rests anywhere in my tank except for one place in the front of the tank where the detritus collects and I can siphon it. As for the rocks, everywhere is getting flow, but my problem is in two places, the flow isn't strong enough to really move any detritus. So for me, I know I have to add a little more flow in there which in my case can be done with just another single Tunze. I tried moving what I have around now to see if I can maybe find the "sweet spot" but by me moving it, I only end up with another area lacking. In terms of your tank, you'll have to figure exactly where you need. If cost is an issue, you probably can't beat adding Seio's. I've asked the same questions as you are asking here and the only input I got is what I told you or "theoretically" what should work. But no-one can really say well, put it here or there without actually seeing your tank and watching the flow for themselves (which I learned) HTH a little bit

 

[daytonaconnecti]

yea, no real plug and play, by looking at the wast that floats around after blowing off the rocks, it all gathers at the front, execpt the larger stuff blows around until the lr catches it or until i can with a net,when i drop a peice of flake in to test, it goes all around and under and over everything until it breaks apart, i think my lr is still going through a heavy sheading faze, due to the fact it was badly saturated from the start....wish i had a video of my water flow after blowing off the rocks....

 

[NaH2O]

I like the idea of a manifold on the top of the tank with outputs pointing into the water. You can make it out of PVC on a closed loop, and only have the loc line where the outputs are in the water. Locline exposed to air, as pointed out, will sometimes suck air and cause microbubbles because it isn't air tight.

With the tank shaped the way it is, if you have outputs along the top, you will be able to direct the flow in all different ways. You can bounce off the sides, or point it directly in the direction you want the flow to go.

Does anybody have experiance drilling an Acrylic Tank when it is full or half full?

I have only seen one picture of a sump getting drilled while it was full. What the person did was make a 3 sided box (4th side against the side of the sump) and inserted it in the area where the hole was to be made. Then he siphoned all the water out of that box, and drilled the sump. Put the plumbing all in, and removed the 3 sided box. I'm not sure how well it would work in a tank, or if he was lucky, but that's the only thing I can think of. Hope it helps!

 

[reedman]

You're going to have shedding for some time. Once that subsides you can determine where you need to add flow. If you are getting the detritus to collect in one spot and syphon it out you are doing great.

One option you could look at is to use an external pump, plumb it up and over the top of the tank and back into the water. Then you have two options: Run a PVC manifold under the rim of the tank (zip tie it to the tank rim) and have multiple outlets you can adjust or move, or you can put a "T" at the top of the plumbing coming from the pump and use vinyl tubing & PVC to get the flow where you want it. I like this option because it allows more flexibility to tweak flow, add other components, and adjust locations without having to replumb everything.

You can use PHs in the tank, but I think you will get sick of looking at them. They are great for blowing off the tank though. And if you put a 50 or 100 micron filter sock on your overflow output to the sump right before you blow off your rocks you will remove all that crap and have reasonably clear water pretty quickly.

 

[daytonaconnecti]

View attachment 10584 thanks, reedman. any idea on how long it will keep sheading that heavy?also i have no sump, just lr skimmer, and going to start useing my new hot magnum filter when i blow of lr... i was thinking iam using a 800 gph pumt to run the side flow with the scwd, thinking of using a bigger pump and T off of the loc-line fittings iam now using and using something like this around the rim, it cav have any combo of tip or nozzles added anywhere in the link...

 

[mcvicker]

Well I am new to the hobby, so not sure how much help this will be. But I set my tank up in a manner that made sense to me. I buried a pvc manifold around the perimeter of my tank under the sand with 1/2" threaded sockets every 5 inches or so. I plumed a submersable pump behind my rock directly into the manifold. I am now playing around with nozzle type and so forth. I bought a few of the loc line, but they are pricey in this cheap set up. So I snagged a bunch of equipment nozzles from work, and some eductors, and am playing with these. I wouldn't recommend eductors, unless you have a 200+ gallon tank which I don't.
I got a lot of particulate on my rocks with this until I took the return manifold from my sump and created a top PVC manifold and drilled holes in it every inch or so directed down at the rocks. This definitely kept the live rock clean. I have a ~900 gph sump pump so pretty good flow onto the rocks. So, now everything is building up behind/under the rocks. My overflow is homemade pvc plumbing, but I am going to look at some sort of overflow off the back to get a good even flow out the back which should help a lot.

 

[Krish]

But, I buried a pvc manifold around the perimeter of my tank under the sand with 1/2" threaded sockets every 5 inches or so

From what I remember Bill's BB...other than that great ideas

 

[reedman]

any idea on how long it will keep sheading that heavy?

No way to know. Depends on how saturated they are, how efficiently you are removing the detritus from the rocks, etc.

also i have no sump, just lr skimmer, and going to start useing my new hot magnum filter when i blow of lr...

No problem here. Good idea to use the HOT filter to remove the detritus. You can also just use a 5 gallon bucket & a filter sock to filter the water after the rock blasting and just put the clean water back into the tank. Or use this as an oportunity to do a water change.

i was thinking iam using a 800 gph pumt to run the side flow with the scwd, thinking of using a bigger pump and T off of the loc-line fittings iam now using and using something like this around the rim, it cav have any combo of tip or nozzles added anywhere in the link...

This will work, but I would go a different direction. Give me a little time to think on it and I'll try to come up with something.

 

[daytonaconnecti]

thanks, how many times can i reuse this water, also if you remember, i have one 1275,ghp. cl setup to push water down and across the bottom toward the front, and i have a 800gph, cl setup with a scwd that alternates water down each side toward the front glass, all the wast settles to the front, but alot of the waste and bigger wastes settles back on the lr... it seems like i could stand their all day and repeat....if we come up with better flow on the rocks,and use my hot magnum,more than once a week, it might help...

 

[reedman]

So here's my thought.

First, you are going to need this to be adjustable because right now you want to blast the rock, but when tehere is coral in there you don't want to blast the coral. You also want to be able to adjust it as corals grow and flow patterns change.

With that in mind I would run a closed loop pump externaly. Run a return pipe straight up to the back of the tank and put a "T" on it. After the "T" use either hard PVC to either back corner of the tank or just put a thread to barbed fitting on either side and add some vinyl tubing to the point you want the water to enter the tank. At that point switch back to hard PVC to go into the water (via a couple of 90 degree fittings). At the end use loc-line for fine tuning. This will allow you to reconfigure by just redoing the soft lines and not having to buy out all of the PVC fittings at Lowes. Additionally this will allow you to move your outlets around the upper perimeter of the tank, raise and lower the height in the tank (via longer or shorter PVC lengths) and fine tune the direction/pattern of the flow with loc-line fittings. Everything that is over/in the tank does not need to be glued; just push in tight and let 'er go. That way you can change it without having to cut and reglue. This also allows for changes down the road like adding a seaswirl if you wanted or some other means of moving water around.