Wavebox, good or bad?

[Aquattro]

All I'm trying to do is get a more even flow. I have 4 Tunze in the tank, but they're all at the top, and I get a lot of detritus settling on my rock work. I could turkey baste the rock every 6 hours, so figured some more random flow, not top down, might help that. I have a sequence that I can program into my Apex that will apparently give me the waves without the box, but again, I'm concerned with tank integrity.

[Mrfish55]

Big tanks are usually overbuilt, I never had any concerns about tank integrity and I have never heard of a tank failure that could be directly related to the use of a wave box, I have seen surge units in use that looked far more severe than a wave box and those tanks never had an issue as well.

[Aquattro]

Originally Posted by Mrfish55

Big tanks are usually overbuilt, I never had any concerns about tank integrity and I have never heard of a tank failure that could be directly related to the use of a wave box, I have seen surge units in use that looked far more severe than a wave box and those tanks never had an issue as well.

I agree, although I bought mine used and re-sealed it myself, so I'm lacking a bit of confidence in it
Realistically, I think the tank is ok, and I know the stand won't shift, but....

I do need to do something to generate more of an up swell in the flow though, and I think a wave might do it.

[fkshiu]

I had one for several years without issue.

Roger Vitko has answered this question a number of times over one RC. Something to the effect that your standard commercially-built aquarium is meant for about 15 - 20 years of use and running a wavebox 24/7 is expected to knock a couple of years off that life expectancy.

You can hook up a photocell to the wavebox and not have it running at night to reduce the wear and tear if your worried.

[Aquattro]

Franklin, thanks! I'm going to add a wave with my existing streams and see what I think..

[lastlight]

Yep Roger claims 10% reduction and nobody is going to say they know this for a fact. It can't help the tank's strength of course but I suspect we'd all replace or upgrade long before things would fail assuming the tank's properly built.

Having said that... I have been considering them myself and also am a bit scared. A 1" wave in a 400g is a ton of weight shifting around!

[Aquattro]

Originally Posted by lastlight

Having said that... I have been considering them myself and also am a bit scared. A 1" wave in a 400g is a ton of weight shifting around!

Actually, a couple of tons

Like I said, I have a program for the Apex that will give me a wave, so I'll set that up this coming week and see what I think. Right now I have too much gunk settling out on the rock work, so I'm hoping this does the trick without blowing the tank

[Borderjumper]

I loved mine..Without it the detritus settles on the rock tons more than it did with the wave box.. BUT as you know, for some reason the bottom of that tank cracked. The Seastar guy found nothing wrong with the tank, or the stand.

I don't know if the wave box had anything to do with it.. But in my mind it may have.

[Aquattro]

Shelley, yours is the one that put the fear in me

[Borderjumper]

Originally Posted by Aquattro

Shelley, yours is the one that put the fear in me

I know..