Settings for Tunze 6095 powerhead and controllers

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Ksmmike

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Hi,
I have a Tunze 6095 at each end of my 4 foot x 2 foot,120 gallon tank.(no other power heads, but 2 return nozzels) Is there a recommended setting for the powerheads somewhere? I still don't think I have enough flow, but I'm not sure how high to set them or even if I should turn them down some at night. The surface water churns pretty well and if I put in food, it does scatter quickly with the pumps on. So I do have good flow, just not sure how you can if its enough????

I have the main power on about 8 as well as the pulse power at 8 on each pump. One of them streams constantly while the other pulses on and off every 8 seconds. I'm still trying to find a happy balance. My tank is about 16 months old and has some algae on some of the lower rocks. The higher up is pretty clean. The acros seem to do fairly well considering its a new tank. I lost a few early on, but I don't think I've lost any in the past 6 months.

I have one tang and one foxface that eats some of the algae. I have some snails and crabs as well, but I I don't know if the algae is from not enough flow or not. I only have 7 fish, which I know is an issue in not creating enough nitrates, but I had velvet wipe out my fish last summer, so I've been slow to repopulate after the no fish time and then I qt'd most of the fish. Since then, no problems, but I took down my QT tank and haven't wanted to risk adding more fish.

My parameters are pretty stable with my alk at 8.5. ph at 8.1, salinity at 1.026, calcium at 490-500.
Phosphates were a tad high recently, 0.06 but are down to not registering again. Nitrates are close to zero as well. I'm trying to bump them to maybe .2. I could be wrong in doing so, but some of my acros have faded some. I know flow is important as well, so I'm trying to make sure that's not my issue.

I have Eco Tech leds for lighting and use one of the templates for an overall reef tank since I have hammers (which do really well) some acros, leptos, chalices, ect in the middle and lower sections of the tank and on the sand bed. If I have to, I'll take a photo, but the camera on my phone is cracked, and I don't have a macro lens with my real camera. Bottom line, I'm curious if you think I have enough flow, or I should up the power on each pump? Is there a recommended setting for a 4 foot tank like my set up?

thanks
Mike
 

Tennsquire

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I have two 6095s in my 75 SPS reef (4 ft tank as well); it depends somewhat on what you're keeping. They're run by a Tunze multi controller. You can also connect the two pumps to run them opposite of each other and attach a light sensor so they power down somewhat at night. Fantastic pumps and customer service.
 

rvitko

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Sorry for the late reply, I would consider 2 6095's in a 120 enough for all but the most demanding SPS. If you get more into acres you might consider a 3rd or 6105's instead. Generally you can solve a lot of issue by placement and programming. I am not clear on what you mean by 8. Our controllers are labeled 20-100%. I would pulse them every few seconds from 30-100% and I prefer to not use night mode as pH already drops at night and less flow means more drop. Hair algae is likely to get worse with more nutrients, I would suggest more flow, less light (duration or intensity, just a small change, 1 hr less, 10% less intense, etc) you might also try a bacteria product like our Care Bacter or any of the others on the market, typically algae in a low nutrient, newer tank means things are out of whack, algae is doing the job bacteria should do. I would raise the nutrient levels, especially with high light intensity I would generally want .05-.1 PO4, minimum .03 and Nitrate of at least 5-10 ppm. If you have any nutrient controls you use I would stop using them and add more fish and feed more, even if you just feed more coral foods, reef chili, polyp lab, benepets, these all raise nutrients. In general if you stick to hardy fish from a good LFS, stuff like fire fish, chromis, etc have very little disease risk and you can just do something like Blue Life quick quarantine as a safe guard and if you get tangs or angels, you pay a premium but a place like TSM or Marinecollectors.com the fish are all prequarantined and you definitely get what you pay for.
 
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Ksmmike

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Thanks for the response rvitko. I guess I should have said 80% not 8, you're correct. Ive been feeding more trying to raise the nutrients and shut off the skimmer a few hours each day. Its only been a week of doing that, but I have noticed some of the algae dying off near the bottom. I don't have a terrible issue with. It was far worse a few months back. Thanks for all the suggestions. I was concerned I wasn't getting enough flow, but with your comment I think I am.
thanks again
Mike
 

rvitko

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It would be worth going to 100%, and pulsing broadens the flow, think of slow and fast water colliding, you get a mushroom cloud where they hit. It tends to work better than constant flow, even 100% and 50%.
 

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