Wave maker stopped working - tank looks better than ever.

[Loring]

I currently have an Evo 13.5 and I realized yesterday that my Hygger mini wave maker was struggling. It was freezing and then it would go for a minute show an error code briefly and then start up again, so I ordered a new one that should be here tomorrow. I have upgraded the stock pump to a Sicci 1.0 so it seems to move the water pretty good on it's own. Came downstairs this evening and my tank looks fantastic my hairy mushrooms are absolutely huge right now my hammer coral is bigger than it normally is and my zoa's are all puffed up and looking good too. When the wave maker was in I was running it on the lowest power setting with medium to low frequency waves I also had it blowing straight into a rock to break it up a bit. Now I'm wondering if I should even bother putting the new wave maker back in or if my corals being stretched out is due to lack of flow and it's actually a bad thing. My clown fish which unfortunately host my intake actually started moving around the tank today too (my female actually lets the intake suck her against the inlets, I'd worry but she's been doing it for months so I'm thinking she is just a derp still drive me nuts though.

I guess my question is, are my corals stretched out because they are lacking flow and I should put the wave maker in...or is my tank actually happier without it? Couple pics from this evening I actually didn't know my hairy mushrooms were this big to be honest.

 

[blaxsun]

Your corals look really good. The Sicce probably really increased your flow rate in the Evo - which is why they're probably doing great without the other powerhead. I don't necessarily think you need to run the powerhead, but if you do I'd dial the speed back quite a bit.

 

[CoralB]

They will still need current , maybe you can slow it down a bit but my opinion is you alway need some current in the tank . Maybe aim the current so that your coral are not in direct current

 

[Loring]

They will still need current , maybe you can slow it down a bit but my opinion is you alway need some current in the tank . Maybe aim the current so that your coral are not in direct current

So I had it down tucked behind the rock on the far left on the lowest possible power setting so maybe I just need to look into a different wave maker. I'll play around with it tomorrow some when it gets here maybe try positioning it differently too. I'm just starting to think it's a little too much between the two maybe.

 

[Rico's Reefnecks]

Interesting - I've got the same setup (right down to the clownfish hosting an outlet nozzle, sigh) and I've stuck with the wavemaker to keep flow going past a few SPS that i'm trying - I basically stuck them on a higher rock and put the wavemaker higher up, aimed at them - this gets my duncan and mushrooms out of the way of the flow (which also doesn't really blast all the way across the tank on 40%, I find). I'd trust your instincts here as far as the corals - usually puffed up softies and LPS are happy, and if it gets the fish out of the corner even better. See what happens!

Just keep an eye on detritus - when I moved mine around I noticed food and fish waste accumulating in a corner, so I just have to siphon that every now and then.

Sweet tank, awesome hammer!