Please help with return pump suggestions

musictoyourhome

musictoyourhome

New member
Im in the process of setting up my new tank, and i now need help picking a return pump. I will need a submersible pump that will be in the sump under the cabinet. The tank will be 120 gallons and have a 1"drain and 3/4" return. I am interested in a pump that is quiet and energy efficient. I was considering the water blaster 3000 pump by octopus. I currently have a mag on my 75 gallon and like it but would like something that is more energy efficient. Any suggestions would really help.
thanks again for all who made suggestions about the skimmer. I will be getting the ATB 840.
 
just realized the drain in 1.5' and return is 3/4' on the tank. My choices are now between water blaster 5000 and ehim 1262. Any help would be great.'Thanks
 
tunze silence won't work? Eheims are super solid and have an outstanding track record. The water blasters are much newer, but seem to get good reviews. I don't know flow numbers off top of my head. I wouldn't go for more than 5-700gph through the sump anyways personally.
 
Where are you located? Do your heaters run year round? A more efficient pump won't heat the water as much. Which may or may not be good. If the heaters are already coming on then they will just come on more to make up for the loss of the pump.
 
Im in Ny. the heater is only on in the winter months. it seems that the lights keep the water warm enough, I think. my temp is pretty stable around 78 and I do have a chiller.
 
Just thought I would check. I switched to LEDs for energy cost saving and then considered a pump. Since the heater runs a more efficient pump won't help me.
 
is the sicce 3.0 strong enough for a 120, I thought the pump should provide 10x return. This is what the tank builder told me. I'm pretty confused now.....
 
I have read anything from about 2x to 50x it depends on what you want. I have about 5, but am thinking of going a little higher.
 
musictoyourhome said:
is the sicce 3.0 strong enough for a 120, I thought the pump should provide 10x return. This is what the tank builder told me. I'm pretty confused now.....
Click to expand...

I don't think you have to put 10x's through the sump necessarily, it all depends on how you want your sump to be. The more you push through the sump the better designed you need to make it otherwise you are asking for micro bubbles. I thin the 10x's figure is a hold over from a time when people used to like to get some of their required tank flow from the return but power heads today are so good and of good variety that the flow from the return doesn't really need to factor in much. If you are going to use 2xMP40's the tank flow is already taken care of pretty much.

Are you considering running anything else off the pump like any reactors, chillers or UV etc? If so something like an ATB Flowstar is a great pump. It's powerful, quiet and efficient. If you don't run anything else besides a return off it the pump probably would overwhelm your overflow so you'd have to valve it back but if you do run other things it's a great choice. I have the Flowstar's twin, the Laguna Max-Flo 1500, on my 75 but it runs a BP reactor, feeds a chiller and a separate refuge while still nearly overwhelming my overflow.
 
Thank you again for taking the time to pass along any info.
My sump is very basic, has no baffles. The return on my current tank falls right into a filter bag. I will be using the same sump on the new setup. I do currently run a chiller and phosban reactor which I will be keeping for the new set up. One of the pumps I was thinking about was the water blaster 5000, and possibly feeding the chiller with this as well. I don't have much experience plumbing so I'm a little nervous about teeing off the return, although it would be great to eliminate the chiller pump if I could. My drain is 1.5" and return will be 3/4" . I know many pump outputs are 1 inch, can the 1" be converted to fit the 3/4 return? I also do have until next week to decide if I want to change the return to 1" before the builder drills it.
 
I love having one main pump and a manifold with a bunch of ball valves to tune how much flow independently goes to different things. I never made one before a couple months ago and it turned out ok:
manifold.JPG


It consists of just some 1" T's and elbows from Home Depot and some union ball valves and flex PVC from online. It only looks decent because I made such a mess with the purple primer that I decided to paint it black even though no one is gonna see it, otherwise you wouldn't be seeing a picture of the thing;) One valve goes to the chiller/return and the others go to the BP reactor and refuge, the 4th is gonna be for GFO/UV. I was running it with a Mag 9.5 which was great but I wanted a little more flow through my refuge and adding the phosban reactor was going to push it a little too far so I decided to get the Max-Flo as an upgrade because a Mag12 was likely going to use a lot of power. I couldn't be happier. The Max-Flo 1500 feeds everything I mentioned above and nearly outdoes my 1" drain pipe all while using what looks like less power than the Mag9.5.
 
Last edited:
BigKahuna said:
I love having one main pump and a manifold with a bunch of ball valves to tune how much flow independently goes to different things. I never made one before a couple months ago and it turned out ok:


It consists of just some 1" T's and elbows from Home Depot and some union ball valves and flex PVC from online. It only looks decent because I made such a mess with the purple primer that I decided to paint it black even though no one is gonna see it, otherwise you wouldn't be seeing a picture of the thing;) One valve goes to the chiller/return and the others go to the BP reactor and refuge, the 4th is gonna be for GFO/UV. I was running it with a Mag 9.5 which was great but I wanted a little more flow through my refuge and adding the phosban reactor was going to push it a little too far so I decided to get the Max-Flo as an upgrade because a Mag12 was likely going to use a lot of power. I couldn't be happier. The Max-Flo 1500 feeds everything I mentioned above and nearly outdoes my 1" drain pipe all while using what looks like less power than the Mag9.5.
Click to expand...


That's actually an awesome idea. Do you happen to have any pics of it hooked up?
 
vanisher said:
That's actually an awesome idea. Do you happen to have any pics of it hooked up?
Click to expand...

I need a better picture but here is one with it obscured a bit by my refuge light:

refuge.jpg


You can see the main 1" spaflex coming off my old Mag 9.5. Left to right they feed the BP reactor, Phosban Reactor, Chiller/Return and refuge.
 
BigKahuna said:
I need a better picture but here is one with it obscured a bit by my refuge light:

refuge.jpg


You can see the main 1" spaflex coming off my old Mag 9.5. Left to right they feed the BP reactor, Phosban Reactor, Chiller/Return and refuge.
Click to expand...

That's pretty awesome.

Do you have any issues controlling the flow to the reactors?

I'm considering using your design but my concern is getting the proper flow to the GFO/Carbon, and BP reactors while keeping the flow to the returns correct.
 
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