how powerheads work

[nightstalk]

i know that im definetely going to need some water movement in my 135 gallon tank that i am making into a reef tank. Does a powerhead need a waterpump or air pump to make water movement or is the powerhead itself its own pump? very confused on how these work, please help.

 

[hot883]

Originally Posted by nightstalk
i know that im definetely going to need some water movement in my 135 gallon tank that i am making into a reef tank. Does a powerhead need a waterpump or air pump to make water movement or is the powerhead itself its own pump? very confused on how these work, please help.
Power heads use to be used on under ground filters. NOW they are used just for water movement. They are a self contained device that sucks in water and pushes it out. They come with suction cups that enable you to stick them on the glass wherever you want them. HINT: suction cups don't work to good or for very long.

 

[jdecter]

A power head is basically a tube with a pump in it. It has a intake port usually with some sort of cover to keep fish out, and a blower port usually with a fan shaped nozzel or directional nozzel so you can point it where you want.
Thats about it. AND theres good ones ans crappy ones, I recommend these, Tunze are great but SUPER expensive, I bought to Maxi Jets, just as good but cheaper.
http://www.tropicalfishoutlet.com/Dr...=Power%20Heads
Then theres this new one EVERYONE is trying to buy, it will be purchasable in 2 weeks but you can pre order them via this link:
http://www.tropicalfishoutlet.com/Dr...Category=Pumps

 

[nightstalk]

i was looking at the eheim aquaball powerhead. I was thinking of buying two of these for my 135 reef tank. Also im seeing these things that go on the ends of powerheads to make it like a wavemaker. Any info on these things, are they good or just a gimmick?

 

[fender]

@ jdecter
Watch the store links. You are on the SWF stores website. Not cool to post someone elses store. Just giving you a heads up.
On topic.
MaxiJets are cheap, last forever, work with wavemakers and have several mods to make them even better.

 

[teresaq]

are you talking about hydro flows?? if so I love mine. They fit on the output of your power head, and move the water in a circle around your tank

 

[nightstalk]

Originally Posted by TeresaQ
are you talking about hydro flows?? if so I love mine. They fit on the output of your power head, and move the water in a circle around your tank
those are the ones im talkin about

verry good then?, ill have to see if they will work on the eheim aquaball

 

[gary1328]

Hello, I have a 125 gallon reef and I had 7 maxi-jet 1200's and I thought I had alot of water movement.
Long story short, I had an experienced reef aquarist come over to my house and he said with the amount of live rock that I had (150-200lbs) my flow was not strong enough.
So now I broke down and bought a Tunze stream kit with controller.
each Tunze pushes 1850 GPH and with the controller they can be set on different programs. This was well worth the investment, there are no dead spots in my tank now and all of the debris seems to make its way out and into the filter system.
What I was told was that you should have flow 20 - 30 times your aquarium size.