Wavebox, good or bad?

[Aquattro]

Originally Posted by Casey8

As I have been doing research for my tank, I have read it somewhere that the wavebox will reduce life of your tank because its stressing your silicone tank back and forth with waves. But you can reduce the waves by lowering your box or even just let the box sit at the bottom of the tank.

Kinda my concern, right there. Reduce life by how much? Should I start buying a lot of mops and a spare 180?

[Casey8]

Every web site I have read it says will reduce about 1/3 some said 1/4 life of your tank ... whatever ... I want to get one for myself in the future anyway. Just don't make it over half inch waves, I think my tank will be OK for another 8 years. I don't want to look my fish are dancing back and forth with waves, it makes me dizzy just to look at the fish from some other people's tank.

[Mrfish55]

I ran one for 3 years on my 300 with no I'll effects but it did break down 3 times, finally gave up and replaced it with a pair of MP 40 s I did like the wave effect on the corals and there was no dead spots in the tank but for the money mine was a POS and I will not replace it.

[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..

[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