I need help on how many gph my new power head should be?

[Bcb577]

My current power head is totally inadequate,I'm curious to see how many gph it should be in my ten gallon reef tank?

[seabass]

It depends on what you want to keep. 20 times turnover (200gph total flow) would be a minimum. I'd say that 300gph would be better for a mixed reef without SPS. For corals like SPS, you might want in excess of 500gph.

[Bcb577]

It depends on what you want to keep. 20 times turnover (200gph total flow) would be a minimum. I'd say that 300gph would be better for a mixed reef without SPS. For corals like SPS, you might want in excess of 500gph.

ok I'm gonna keep mostly softies,perhaps some lps,i have no idea what gph the power head is now but ill be upgrading thanks again!

[Clown79]

It depends on corals, rock placement, and tank dimensions.

 

I have 2 powerheads and a filter for my 15g.

100gph filter, 420 koralia, and sicce 530

 

My 10g has an mj900 for the return and a 100gph pico PH

[jeffmr4]

I thought the rule was to be able to turn over your water volume 5 times in an hour in addition to calculating what it has to push it up and any bends. Of course more can be used too. 500 gph on a tank seems a bit much to me.

[PwnMe]

I thought the rule was to be able to turn over your water volume 5 times in an hour in addition to calculating what it has to push it up and any bends. Of course more can be used too. 500 gph on a tank seems a bit much to me.

That rule applies to freshwater usually. Coral "breathe" and release wastes that require water flow. SPS require 50 times turnover. Soft require less but usually 10 - 20 times. Some SPS keepers have 100 times turnover in bare bottom tanks. I'm shooting for 70 in my tank.

[jeffmr4]

I got this information from here,

 

http://www.drsfostersmith.com/Pic/article.cfm?dept_id=&aid=243

 

It has a picture of sps at the top.

[cruiZe]

Return pump (thru sump or fuge) sure 5x but then power head creates much more flow within the tank.

[PwnMe]

For filtration, I would say that 5 times turnover is good. But 50 times turnover taking into account powerheads is important for SPS.

[cruiZe]

When I had a 15g I had 2 korelias x 400 each and a fuge with 80 ish . Corals and fish loved it

[Bcb577]

Wow I'm really low on flow in my ten gallon! I'm not sure what I have,lol it's not the typical prop type,looks like something that could almost come stock with the tank,I did buy it separate but I was just getting intoreefing and at the time I hadn't found this forum,I guess next week I'm going to go out and buy a power head,my lfs kinda sucks it mostly has only frugal stuff,not much to choose from,maybe ill buy online?

[PwnMe]

Wow I'm really low on flow in my ten gallon! I'm not sure what I have,lol it's not the typical prop type,looks like something that could almost come stock with the tank,I did buy it separate but I was just getting intoreefing and at the time I hadn't found this forum,I guess next week I'm going to go out and buy a power head,my lfs kinda sucks it mostly has only frugal stuff,not much to choose from,maybe ill buy online?

 

Once you get a little too into reef keeping you find out you need to buy everything online.

 

My LFS started getting some higher end fluval stuff, but no LED lighting that could easily sustain a reef.

 

They don't have Ecotech Vortechs or anything.

[Clown79]

I will always disagree that softies like low flow.

 

In my experience, every tank I had with low flow- nothing was happy. As soon as I increase the flow, everything becomes happy.

 

I have 66x flow in my tank- i have 1 sps