flow issue

[claynelson]

i will start with description of the old set up.
main return pump was a hammerhead feeding the display (230) and becket skimmer 50 back tank for smaller fish and corals. no flow issues at all but the hammerhead and the becket pump were so noisy i could hear them throughout the house at night. so i decided to do an overhaul and hoped it would be the last.
upgraded to a bm curve A9 and a ecotech M1 and hoped for the best. after a 16 hour day of extensive sump modifications and complete plumbing redo i was able to get 2600lph through my uv sterilizer and into the display tank. the sterilizer requires 4044 lph to work on the ich problem that the Achilles tang has. so i ordered a L1 in from the states thinking that the specs they boast has to do what i need. so waited the week for it to show up cut out the M1 and its flex line and switched it to run the 50 all the way turned down and ran new 1 inch flex line straight into the uv and got an increase but no where near what i expected i now run 3400 lph into the display through the uv for roughly 15% below what is required.

since the dc change over the ich has become worse Achilles went from on average of 6 spots to alot more and it is starting to show on some of the big angles.

my question to the masses is what should i do now? i have a M1 that im not using to its full potential. an L1 that doesnt live up to its full potential and sick fish. ive thought of ordering in a wye and trying to run the 2 in parallel. i owuld have to order the wye from the states online and would cost a horrible amount but if its a doable and functional fix i would have no issues and i would order a much smaller dc pump to do the 50 gal.

thanks for any suggestions and guidance.

 

[mcarroll]

First, boost up the diet you're feeding the tank. More live foods. More whole-frozen sea foods. More foods high in carotenoids. All of these things will boost the immune systems of your fish. They shouldn't perpetually have ich like that with or without UV.
Second, it sounds like the pumps you're running are lower pressure pumps than the pump you had. Are the new pumps returnable?
Third, for UV a slower flow should increase the dose against things like Ich. How is your UV set up though and how many watts? Sounds like it's only getting a fraction of your return water?
Fourth, what's your return like – how high and how crazy is the plumbing up to the returns?
Fifth, increasing your plumbing diameter should give your current pumps a boost since friction losses should be cut back considerably. 1" is small at the flow rate you're talking.