Water Flow in a 20g

[dhayden]

I am setting up a 20g reef that has been sitting in moving boxes for over ten years. I had always had trouble figuring out good flow in the tank to avoid dead spots. there is almost 45 lbs of rock in the tank so it is pretty full. The set up i have used is two old penguin power heads, im guessing around 250gph, on a wave maker, not the best powerheads but hey after 10 years they started right up . Any way I was debating scraping this idea with a sieo 650. I would have to give up the wave maker but maybe this would give me more of a total flow? I think 2 might be too much. Down the line i was planning on adding a 10g sump with a mag5 on a scwd. but i havent done this yet. Long post :0 but is there any best methods out there? I have seen a lot of tanks with those sieos point straight forward to the glass. Right now my PH's are in the upper rear corners pointing at the front middle point of the glass.

 

[TekCat]

it all depends on what you plan to keep there. For softies - 250gph would be sufficient, but for SPS it'd be too little of a flow.

You're right, dead spots are your enemy, much worse enemy than not enough flow. I would guess that if you planning on current switching using Mag5, along with a couple powerheads you already should have plenty of flow. (given that you don't have much free space left, after all 45Lbs LR in 20G tank) Maybe .... you could upgrade your Penguins to something more powerful like MaxiJet 1200
...just my opinion

 

[capefear]

try 2 powerheads

 

[Monkeyfish]

Try taking out some of that rock. IS there any room to put anything else?