Pump/Random Flow advice

[YourBelgianThings]

Hi

First time poster, so I hope this isn't a question that has been answered 1000 times already. We got a tank a few months ago. Fluval Evo 13.5/52 litres. All seems to be going well Everything in the tank appears to be doing very well and water testing all fine, both at home and when I take sample to our LFS ("if anything, your water is too clean...").

I want to upgrade the stock pump and add a random flow generator. My question is whether a sicce syncra silent 0.5, plus a VCA random flow generator (picture attached, I think) will be sufficient or will I need a stronger pump? (I don't want to add a wavemaker unless absolutely necessary, mainly for aesthetic reasons). I should admit that I have already ordered the 0.5 pump, but can send it back if I need to! If the advice is wait and see, then that's fine too.

The tank has:
* 4 soft corals (GSP. ricordia, kenyan tree and toadstool) in place for 2 months and doing well
* a torch coral, more recently introduced but looking very happy,
* two clownfish and 2 cardinal fish
* small clean up crew of hermits and an urchin.

Thanks.

 

[Timfish]

There's no such thing as "ideal flow". It depends on what your animals have acclimated too and can acclimate too, and that can be very different depending on the species. As far as adding the random flow generator to your system I think you should take notes to see how your animals look before and after adding it to decide which is preffered by them and which do you think is more aesthetic.

 

[BryanM]

Without a wavemaker I would have errored on getting the 1.0... The VCA requires some backpressure to work correctly and the .5 pump is (I believe) weaker than the stock pump.

What I'd be looking for in your tank: Moderate+ surface agitation and moderate+ torch flow, which should be plenty for the toadstool as well.

I think the 1.0 is a better option to pull this off without a wavemaker.

 

[Raamish14]

Without a wavemaker I would have errored on getting the 1.0... The VCA requires some backpressure to work correctly and the .5 pump is (I believe) weaker than the stock pump.

What I'd be looking for in your tank: Moderate+ surface agitation and moderate+ torch flow, which should be plenty for the toadstool as well.

I think the 1.0 is a better option to pull this off without a wavemaker.

How many gph do you recommend for a dual nozzle random flow generator from vca? Im running a 15 gallon fowlr tank. I have the sicce micra plus currently but have ordered an ai axis 20 as well.

 

[BryanM]

How many gph do you recommend for a dual nozzle random flow generator from vca? Im running a 15 gallon fowlr tank. I have the sicce micra plus currently but have ordered an ai axis 20 as well.

150-300gph. VCA has flow recommendations on their site however... I would go with what they recommend.