Powerhead for surface agitation?

[stash98]

I was wondering if there was a powerhead that is easy to aim up for max surface agitation.

 

I have a wavemaker but that was not cutting it, the surface was still messy. And the power of it was keeping my clownfish on the other side of the tank pretty much all the time. He now swims all over the tank again now that it's off.

 

Need something not too powerful that will keep my water surface clean. I have a 12 gallon mr aqua long.

[xAyanex]

I have a biocube 29. The filter pump output comes out near the surface of the water and has an attachment that I aimed up. Otherwise I would use one of my koralia nano 425s and just point one of them up. Works for my situation.

[vision]

take a look at tunze powerheads.

[Clown79]

A koralia 420 would be good or one of the Tunze.

[stash98]

A koralia 420 would be good or one of the Tunze.

 

 

So I should have mentioned I have koralias and really hate them. They are large, loud and get dirty really often. I may try one again since I have it already, but I'm not a huge fan.

 

Tunze look a lot better but they are super pricey. I essentially need something not that powerful that will distress the surface of half my tank. I set my wavemaker to it's slowest speed and output and turned the waves off. It is dead silent and distresses the other half of the surface. The flow inside the tank is good as well now. Detritus moves in the current and at some point gets filtered out.

 

Starting to realize I had too much flow in my tank. My clownfish is like a different fish now. I think there is definitely a case for having too much flow that's unnecessary. As much as the wave function of the pump was cool, it did nothing for my corals or fish. My tank already looks much better today. Just need to distress the other half of my tanks surface and it should be perfect.

[jimbonds]

Check out the Tunze 6040. It's a controllable DC powerhead and is only ~$140. The design of it will definitely allow you to focus more flow to the surface if that is your desire. It's unique design also allows it to be very unobtrusive compared to the more traditional designs. FYI, I hate the Koralia as well. I had one of the 425's in my BC29 and I could never get my flow dialed in just right. I run two in my frag tank but that's a completely different beast as there is no overflow or return pump and I alternate them so that each one is on for only 12 hours.

[stash98]

That sounds awesome but $140 for a small powerhead is overkill for me. What I am thinking of is more along the lines of a small chinese pump that I can aim at the surface. Something around $20. I don't need a ton of flow, just surface disruption.

[jimbonds]

Why do you think you need more surface agitation? I may have missed it, but what kind of tank do you have? You could consider an air pump without the air stone. I did that in a hospital tank once. Most air pumps comes with a small valve on the hose so you can dial in the flow. If you remove the air stone then you'll get some nicely sized bubbles that won't froth up the surface but will break the surface tension of the water resulting in agitation as well as oxygen exchange. There are people running pico setups in flower vases and the only thing they have for flow is an air pump.

[stash98]

Why do you think you need more surface agitation? I may have missed it, but what kind of tank do you have? You could consider an air pump without the air stone. I did that in a hospital tank once. Most air pumps comes with a small valve on the hose so you can dial in the flow. If you remove the air stone then you'll get some nicely sized bubbles that won't froth up the surface but will break the surface tension of the water resulting in agitation as well as oxygen exchange. There are people running pico setups in flower vases and the only thing they have for flow is an air pump.

 

 

That's a pretty cool idea. Well my tank has some dead spots. It is a 12 gallon long so it really needs a pump on each end, which I have. The one I want to replace is not possible to aim up. I will retry my Koralia 420, but it may be more flow than I need. Plus it is loud. My tank is currently dead silent.

[Clown79]

I've never had an issue with Koralias, they are all i've used. I have never heard a sound from any of them either. I scrub them with a fine brush at every water change and clean out completely every 2 mnths. Most powerheads should be cleaned regularly.

 

If you need more surface tension the best thing to do is have 2 powerheads, one on each side, slightly pointed up.

[stash98]

I've never had an issue with Koralias, they are all i've used. I have never heard a sound from any of them either. I scrub them with a fine brush at every water change and clean out completely every 2 mnths. Most powerheads should be cleaned regularly.

 

If you need more surface tension the best thing to do is have 2 powerheads, one on each side, slightly pointed up.

 

 

Ill try my koralia again.

[Clown79]

The Tunze are supposed to be good too.

[WelcomeD]

How about EHEIM SURFACE SKIMMER 350?

I used it on planted fresh water tank, but may help you to move the surface oil film to tank.

Or, if you'd like to having strong stream, you may check TUNZE 3162 or 3163.

[ajmckay]

Lol - you want suggestions for surface agitation but you give almost no other details other than you have a 12g long and a "wavemaker" ?

 

Lol again.

 

So the obvious choices are:

1) An overflow/surface skimmer. You can get surface skimmers for most HOB filters.

2) A pump - Seems like a koralia nano 240 or 4xx would be perfect for this tank and you can get them in your price range(ish). Alternatives are the Tunze nanostream 6015, Jebao PP-4, aqueon, sicce nano, JBJ, & Coralife, Even maxi-jet...

3) Manual stirring. Take a net or something and once a day stir it up.

[crawdads57]

I understand what you mean about the korallia pumps. I wanted more surface agitation because I had too much overflow capacity compared to total gph turnover and that resulted in a visible skim of floating film on my tank. It was definitely blocking some PAR. I found that if I turned the korallia pumps so that the power cord was down I could make them give me the angle that disrupted the surface easily while still being far enough under water to keep from sucking air (noisily) here and there. I disagree with using your return input to agitate the surface because this means that more filtered water is going directly into the overflow and is counterproductive to circulating the maximum amount of volume from the display through your filtration system (whether that's an AIO or sumped tank).

 

Try giving yourself a little slack on the power cord and turning the pump so that the cord is down as your looking at pump.

[stash98]

Lol - you want suggestions for surface agitation but you give almost no other details other than you have a 12g long and a "wavemaker" ?

 

Lol again.

 

So the obvious choices are:

1) An overflow/surface skimmer. You can get surface skimmers for most HOB filters.

2) A pump - Seems like a koralia nano 240 or 4xx would be perfect for this tank and you can get them in your price range(ish). Alternatives are the Tunze nanostream 6015, Jebao PP-4, aqueon, sicce nano, JBJ, & Coralife, Even maxi-jet...

3) Manual stirring. Take a net or something and once a day stir it up.

 

 

Truly don't understand what's so funny about that?

I understand what you mean about the korallia pumps. I wanted more surface agitation because I had too much overflow capacity compared to total gph turnover and that resulted in a visible skim of floating film on my tank. It was definitely blocking some PAR. I found that if I turned the korallia pumps so that the power cord was down I could make them give me the angle that disrupted the surface easily while still being far enough under water to keep from sucking air (noisily) here and there. I disagree with using your return input to agitate the surface because this means that more filtered water is going directly into the overflow and is counterproductive to circulating the maximum amount of volume from the display through your filtration system (whether that's an AIO or sumped tank).

 

Try giving yourself a little slack on the power cord and turning the pump so that the cord is down as your looking at pump.

 

Thats a great idea. I'll try that in a bit as I put a 240 in there last night.

How about EHEIM SURFACE SKIMMER 350?

 

I used it on planted fresh water tank, but may help you to move the surface oil film to tank.

 

Or, if you'd like to having strong stream, you may check TUNZE 3162 or 3163.

 

I have never heard of that Eheim. Awesome, thanks for that idea. I may seriously go with this.

[Clown79]

I had the same issue in my tank.

 

I got the Api Superclean hob filter. It has two intakes with a surface skimmer. Problem solved. The black intake blends with my background and it looks a lot better, takes up less room then the surface skimmer you attach to hobs.

 

The api also has quite a lot of flow to it and adjustable.

[reeferbrownies]

Jebaos are great, cheap, DC and can be aimed at the surface.

[stash98]

I had the same issue in my tank.

 

I got the Api Superclean hob filter. It has two intakes with a surface skimmer. Problem solved. The black intake blends with my background and it looks a lot better, takes up less room then the surface skimmer you attach to hobs.

 

The api also has quite a lot of flow to it and adjustable.

 

 

 

Dang that's another great option. I currently have a Fuval internal filter that I run, but this would be even better.

 

Know anything about the smaller 5-20 version? The dimensions are better for me since I'd want this on the side of my tank.

[ajmckay]

 

 

Truly don't understand what's so funny about that?

 

 

Sorry don't mind me - I just find the idealism funny. Creating a post with very little useable information, and oh yeah you don't want a Koralia, and oh yeah it should cost about $20...

 

To simply answer your original question, yes - pretty much any pump/powerhead can be pointed up at the surface to create agitation. But that doesn't really help you - at least I assume it doesn't. Take any powerhead and point it at the surface and it will create surface agitation. Choose a powerhead that's too narrow/powerful and you create a fountain. That's why Koralias & similar pumps are so great - you can easily point it up and create a gentle ripple. If it's sucking air just move it a little lower. If you don't like the Koralias I listed about 7 alternatives that cost between $20-$40.

[stash98]

 

Sorry don't mind me - I just find the idealism funny. Creating a post with very little useable information, and oh yeah you don't want a Koralia, and oh yeah it should cost about $20...

 

To simply answer your original question, yes - pretty much any pump/powerhead can be pointed up at the surface to create agitation. But that doesn't really help you - at least I assume it doesn't. Take any powerhead and point it at the surface and it will create surface agitation. Choose a powerhead that's too narrow/powerful and you create a fountain. That's why Koralias & similar pumps are so great - you can easily point it up and create a gentle ripple. If it's sucking air just move it a little lower. If you don't like the Koralias I listed about 7 alternatives that cost between $20-$40.

 

 

But yet I found a skimming filter that is $24 due to this post. So maybe you can save the snark for someone else, thanks.

[Clown79]

I use the Api superclean 5-20 on my 15g. The flow is really strong, I had to remove 1 of my powerheads when i added the filter. The flow is adjustable.

 

I wrap the yellow insert with my filter floss and drop a bag of media in it. Works great.

[stash98]

I use the Api superclean 5-20 on my 15g. The flow is really strong, I had to remove 1 of my powerheads when i added the filter. The flow is adjustable.

 

I wrap the yellow insert with my filter floss and drop a bag of media in it. Works great.

 

 

Thanks I think I will get this. Let me ask - if I put it in the back left corner of this tank would I just need a powerhead on the right side blowing across then?

 

I can not put it on the side because my light goes across the tank and rests on the lip of each side.

[Clown79]

Should be good. Thats how I have mine set up and it works. I try to do that on purpose to get a good flow all around.

[stash98]

Should be good. Thats how I have mine set up and it works. I try to do that on purpose to get a good flow all around.

 

 

Awesome, thanks. I just ordered this. Looking forward to finally having a clear surface