Its 2am, I cant stand the HUM anymore!

[Jynxgirl]

I had internal pump, and moved to an external iwaki. There is the most annoying hum. Its been a year with the hum and I just hate it! Is there anything to do to quiet it? If I put in it my stand and put a back on my stand and put fans in will that be ok? I want to spray it will noise deafening stuff they stuff in the attics now. :D

Or is a sequence that much quieter? Which of the big pumps do not have this annoying hum? I really need to jump up to a bigger pump anyhow. Right now its a 40rlt that has 1200 gph, and I figure about 900 with head pressure. I have two maxijets in my refugium to keep the red slime from building up. There is just not enough flow going thru it. My refugium area is about 2 and a half ft long and 22 inches wide, 15 inches high with water.

Did anyone else go back to internal after switching to external. I am thinking about ordering two eheim and running them as seperate pumps to each return.

[LoneStar]

They all have a little bit of hum, but the Sequece pumps are by far the most quiet on the market.

[captexas]

Yeah, my Iwaki makes a bit of a hum, even mounted to a small piece of wood that sits on two towels. The back of my stand is open as well. Sometimes it will begin to make more noise than usual and I found taking the pump apart and cleaning the impeller helps some.

[Fish4life]

you can also cut the inlet and outlet pvd and attach vinyl tubing to each side of the pump (2-6 inch pieces works nicely). Gives a place for the vibration to settle out.

cheers,

kurt

[matt]

Is this pump for return or a closed loop? If it's return, consider going to a smaller external and increase the circulation in your tank with tunzes or something like that. They're silent.

Your iwaki, if it's a 40rlt, is more like 750 gph. 40rxt is closer to what you're describing. They have the same motor (120 watts I think) and a fan, which is what you're hearing. If yours has 1" fittings it's the rxt. You could try the pan world 50pxx, which is a 90 watt motor, much quieter, and a little less flow. There is also a popular mod which involves taking off the fan and replacing it with a heat sink. That makes it silent.

Replacing it with a sequence is unlikely to quiet anything, especially if this is a return pump. You'll be pumping way more water through your drains, which will make them louder. You would also have to change the plumbing I believe, because the sequence pumps use much larger in/out fittings.

[alton]

I use a Pan World 50PXX in my office and the 4" fan I use to cool with is louder than the pump.

[bananags]

don't mount your pump to the stand or floor. Put it on a thick 1" foam (home depot has them) or a couple of mouse pad. This will help a lot with the hump noise, that is the motor vibration. (not the pump fan, pump fan should not make loud noise at all.)

[engwife36]

I have a Pan World on the 120 and I never hear it.

[Bill S]

As noted above, try both mounting it on rubber AND if you have hard PVC piping, put a rubber joint in it right near the pump (HD sells them).

On my 2 externals, I have them under the wet bar, on rubber, and with styrofoam surrounding the inside. It's MUCH quieter that way.

[Jynxgirl]

Its the humming sound from the fan that is driving me crazy. I can tell when it starts to vibrate and I take it out and clean it and its better. Its that little hummmmmmmmmmmmmmmm all the time. I have the iwaki sitting on plastic foam then on top of two by four that then have foam underneath them.

I am going to have to get a chiller sooner or later and a dart or something similar could come in handy. I could branch off and run my calcium reactor from the dart as well as feed my two phosban reactors. I would think one pump feeding all the stuff, more flow thru my refugium so I am not supplementing it with power heads (chaeto wasnt spinning/moving, but sitting on the bottom and not doing well before I added the powerheads), would be better and get rid of five 1200 maxis I am running now under my tank. But how quiet is the dart? Does anyone have one that I could come listen to. I want to know if it has the same hum.

[Jynxgirl]

Or does anyone have a velocity pump? Those also seem to be high up on the quiet scale from my research today.

[Fish4life]

i don't think its possbile to experience silence with external pumps, i like a little noise with the tank, tells me thats its working......IMO a silent tank is a dead tank :)

Being tied into the aquaculture world by profession, I've used plenty of sequence pumps and can honestly say you won't be overly thrilled with it. I might be completely out of line here but isn't a panworld and an iwaki very similiar?

cheers,

kurt

[Richard]

Panworlds are a little quieter than iwaki's ime. Genx pumps too.

The velocity pumps are really quiet but since they use the water to cool them instead of a fan they can add a good amount of heat to the tank.

[captexas]

Yeah, I've heard the Velocity pumps can raise your water temp a couple degrees.

Before you get too far into looking into a monster pump to run everything on your tank, check to see what the max flow is for your overflow/drains. I was fixing to buy a larger pump for my tank for more flow until I realized I had gotten ahead of myself. I hadn't calculated to see if the drain/overflow I have could handle the extra GPH. That put a big dent in my plan.

[Henry]

I had a velocity pump, I used it to power my skimmer and it made my tank about 2-3 degrees hotter.

[TexasTodd]

Velocity pumps add heat and break at about 2 years....but are quiet. :)

Is the tank in your bedroom?

As mentioned, about the only way is to go to a smaller return..like Ehiem and add Tunze or equivilent to your system.

Todd

[txstateunivreefer]

also keep in mind that your iwaki is most likely like mine... a pressure rated pump, unlike a sequence dart which is a flow rated pump put your iwaki on some carpet neoprene, or some sort of hot pad etc.

[Jynxgirl]

Well, I will throw the velocity out of the pile then. I dont want to add heat.

I know the old adage about the quiet tank not being good, but its gotten to the point where I am turning the pump off when I am in my living room attempting to watch a movie.

What do other people do with big refugiums? Mine is about 28 to 30 inches long, 22 inches wide, and is about 14 or 15 inches high with water. How much water do other people having going thru comparable areas?

I need a fish room!