Too much flow?

[eyesinthedrk]

Is there a point where "lots of flow" becomes "too much flow"? How far should SPS be from a power head?

In my 6' long tank, on each side I have a korilia 3 down low blowing into the rocks and a tunze 6060 up high for direct flow. I fear the tunze are just too powerful to blow directly on something 6" to 8" away

 

[Laddy]

SPS rarely are happy when being blasted directly with a power head. Try to get indirect, chaotic flow patterns.

 

[Aimforever]

Unless you are seeing die off of tissue directly in the path of the flow, it is not too much.

 

[eyesinthedrk]

yes i am, its a sunset monti frag supposed to be hardy as hell. it started sheding its skin in less than a day the birds nest and purple acro frags still look good l bought and introduced the same day

 

[Mr. Bill]

SPS rarely are happy when being blasted directly with a power head. Try to get indirect, chaotic flow patterns.

Exactly. You should have multiple powerheads at the same level (at least 2), and they should be pointed toward each other or deflected off the glass for random current action.

 

[toothman]

I did not read all the other posts but it is really hard to have to much flow in sps tank, 50 to 80 times sounds good. Also only count a tunze as half it it is off half the time, with a controller. You can use tunze directly on coral because their pulsing action. Sps just do not like direct straight flow. Although direct straight is better than not enough flow.

A good way to measure is to make sure there is enough flow to stir the dirt off the bottom and keep the dirt/detritus suspended, so it can not settle in pockets.

 

[eyesinthedrk]

Thats the issue im dealing with. because of the 6 foot tank i have basically made 3 sections due to the center braces. each section has a peak in the rock work with an led pendant. the tunze's (not controllable) do great in the center of the tank where the opposing flow meets but too powerful on right and left peaks directly in front of them. i think im going to move them towards the front of the side panes and use the broader flow patern of the korilia's for the side peaks total flow from the power heads is almost 40xdt volume return flow in negligible as im aiming for slow flow through he sump.

thanks for the info guys i appreciate the help.

 

[jacob.morgan78]

Sounds like you have a pretty nice setup. I have a 6' tank as well and I use 2 koralia magnum 5's on each end pointed to each other and two tunze nanostreams attached to the back glass pointed to the bottom rear corners. It has pretty good flow but I sometimes think I could use a little more pointed toward the rocks to keep things from building up within the "piles".

Do you have a build thread of your tank and fishroom setup? Or pictures anywhere? I'd like to check out what you have.

Thanks! and HTH

 

[likefish]

just my 2 cents but i have been troubled by this exact question lately. I have a 120 with all of my powerheads on one end due to my rockscape. I achieved "almost" randow flow but a few of my millis were under constant direct flow. For $8 i tried a hydor rotationg nozzel on one of my lockline tank returns. I positioned it so that it blew into the streams of my powerheads. Pulsing, random FLOW!!! in about 90% of the tank!

Cheap and easy solution for me