How much flow on a 120g Reef?

yearofthenick

yearofthenick

Active Member
I am in the process of setting upa 120 gallon reef, and have some questions about water flow.
Image 1 is a drawing of the tank... it's 48 long by 24 deep and 24 high. It has two overflows and two double-headed powerheads.
I've chosen to set up my rock in such a way that I can create a "canyon" in the middle of the tank and have it run diagonally to help with the depth. Image 2 shows the live rock, and the canyon is laid out with the green arrows.
I think I'm going to plumb both powerhead sides together and run them through a mag18... then I'll face them both towards the middle (image 3) is that going to be enough flow?
Plan B is image 4. I can set up a closed loop with two extra powerheads (the blue lines in the image) pointing inward from the front of the tank. That would help the flow, but is it necessary? I may also add these to the existing powerheads and run a mag24 instead, but would that be overkill? Thoughts? Comments???
Any advice would be greatly helpful.
Thanks!



 
tangs123

tangs123

Member
maybe one powerhead on the front of the tank would be better, that is one on a side of the tank not in the middle. With two powerheads pointing at each other you might be creating a whirlpool in the middle of your tank and all the debris would be stuck in the middle instead of flowing into an overflow
 
blazehok68

blazehok68

Active Member
i have a 120 also. ive got 2 koralia #4's, 1 seio 620, and my return pump is 600 gph. that is a total of 3620 gph. i think it is just enough flow.
 
yearofthenick

yearofthenick

Active Member
the mag 18 I'm thinking of using as a return is 1800 gph with 0' head. with a 6' head, it's still at 1200gph. Maybe I should do a closed loop as well. I don't want to use koralia's just because I want my tank to look as seamless as possible... and I'd rather not have little space ship looking things positioned all over my tank.
I think what concerns me the most is the positioning of the pumps. Can I have them both outside pointing in toward the center? Or have it all go from one end to the other? I just want to utilize both overflows, and if all the flow is directed to the corner, it won't be as even.
 
blazehok68

blazehok68

Active Member
just play with the positioning. it will take a while but in the end i am sure you will find a setup that works best for you.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Top