water current and acropora

[captexas]

For a closed loop, you have a drain line that goes to the pump and the a return line from the pump to the tank. There is no sump or anything in line. Using PVC you can make a drain line and put a bulkhead screen on it to keep anything from being sucked in and make a return pipe either going to the SQWD under the water surface or from it to two hang on return pipes. Somewhere there is a nice pic of a simple setup like I'm describing, but I can't remember where that was. Maybe someone else on here will remember and can post it.

[Markster]

Yes, I saw a diagram of that while surfing the web earlier. I do have a problem with the SCWD. I was going to clean it and found a rattle inside. Got the Mag flashlight and saw a white round piece loose inside. It appears to mount or screw on top of a white pipe in the middle of the device. There is no way to open the darn thing up so I guess that one is a goner. I sold the other one, brand new, to Kaiser this past weekend as I felt the two Mag 9.5s running 15 minutes alternating sides would be efficient. Guess I will play with that and see what happens. It will be much more than what I have been used to.

[kaiser]

Check with Jim Norris. I recall he had a seaswirl for sale just a while back.

[GaryP]

I just added 4 Maxijet 12's to my 125 gal. SPS tank. The polyps on my 125 have sure opened up. Looks good. If I could just figure out how to keep the suction cups stuck to the glass I would be doing good. I also have a Blueline 40 external pump on order.

Gary

[Tim Marvin]

Use a surge unit like SeaWorld has. I think they made it from an oilrig pump......LOL. You could probably surge 30-40 thousand gallons per swing....

[Tim Marvin]

If that fails go back to the SQWD.....

[Markster]

How good is the Red Sea Wavemaster Pro? It reads that it comes with a soft start feature...would that be better on the pump/powerheads then turning them off and on every 15 minutes?

[captexas]

As mentioned earlier, some pumps do better than others with the constant off/on. The soft start feature is supposed to help reduce the wear and tear by slowly starting the pumps instead of the sudden surge in power. Still, some pumps handle this better than others. As far as powerheads go, Red Sea recommends MaxiJets as they seem to work the best. Most people that have used the wavemaker agree that the MJs are better than others. For larger pumps like a Mag 9.5, I have never heard how those work under such a setup. In my opinion, the Wavemaster Pro would probably work better than a simple timer shutting them off and on constantly.

[Markster]

I just installed the second Mag 9.5 and have the Coralife timer running them both (15 minutes each side). The timer completely shuts off the pump during intervals. I am going to try this for awhile to see what happens. I removed the Penguin 550 to see the outcome of having two 9.5s running one at time from each side. Thanks for everyone's comments.