Powerheads

[vantgE]

So everyone got me interested in power heads for my tank after baldrangers “calm or choppy watters” topic, and am considering adding a powerhead to my mbuna tank.

It is a 90 gallon with heavy rockwork throughout pretty much entirely from the back to the front between one and two feet high all the way across left too right. I have a fluval 403 in the right-back corner and a aquaclear 200 soon to be 500 in the back-left corner I have no idea if this important but the power head won’t have room to go along the ground and my key purpose is to blow crap into the filters the fluvals intake is surrounded by rock, but I already tried some stuff with a pond pump and it should still be able to suck up a bit of crap with the water going that way. As mentioned I experimented a little with a 300 Gph pond pump, and felt it was much to powerful.

Youre welcome to ignore my previous ramble but basically I want to know how your power heads are setup, where the point, what gph, how high off the bottom of the tank, what brands, how many, any suggestions about what do with my setup
Any detailed information is greatly appreciated thanks

 

[G_Sharky]

I was thinking of getting a powerhead too, but decided to get another AC300 filter instead for the reason that there is little price difference between the 2 and that I'm overstocked so I could use another filter instead....You can go ahead and get a powerhead if you want, but in my own opinion. it's not really necessary if you have a HOB filter......

 

[freddyk]

Powerheads and sand substrate can make good friends. Placing the powerheads near the bottom stirs up the waste so that it can be picked up by the filters. It's impossible to say where the right place to put them because every setup is different, so i suggest setting up the tank without them and then figuring out where they go by determining where the dead spots are.

 

[vantgE]

Well g sharky I went a similar route and bought a ac 500 but it doesn't add much more current then normal, so i;m still inntrested here,
but if you guys aren't telling me anytthing else waht I really need is a gph suggestion

thanks for the help

 

[freddyk]

There's different ways you can go about it. You can use a couple of different powerheads in different places, or you can use piping from one larger powerhead to achieve various exhausts around the tank - something worthwhile to think about if you already have the pond pump.

 

[vantgE]

Thanks for the help I never considered the thje sdecond aproach something to think about almost like above substrate ugj