Air pump question

I was thinking of up grading my air pump, but was wondering about the noise. Now I'm running a 60gal air pump tetra whisper, thinking bout going with a sunleaves durapump 950gph commercial pump. Using 18gal tote 8gal of water with 360 sprayers. Would that pump be overkill or not and could someone tell me if they are loud or noisy. Gonna remove the misters when roots hit the water.

That's probably over kill for just an 18 gallon tote. I run an 80 watt pump to push 12 stones.

You could probably get by with a 4 port fish air pump. I use one for my compost tea and it is listed at 167 gallons or something. That should be plenty of air for that tote.

The commercial pumps are loud. It really helps to suspend them from a bungee cord.

It would either be 18w 600gph or 35w 950gph for 2 12inch airstones

I use a Sunleaves 1,440 gal/hr. pump in 4 5gal buckets with 2 4" air stones in each one. Makes lots of bubbles. My personal opinion is there is no such thing as overkill when it comes to the air. Again that's just my opinion. Oh and yes it makes noise. I have mine sitting on a pile of foam.

faller200 said:

I use a Sunleaves 1,440 gal/hr. pump in 4 5gal buckets with 2 4" air stones in each one. Makes lots of bubbles. My personal opinion is there is no such thing as overkill when it comes to the air. Again that's just my opinion. Oh and yes it makes noise. I have mine sitting on a pile of foam.

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Sorry, not trying to be mean, but your personal opinion is wrong.
Actually, air pumps and massive bubblers are where people go overkill usually. You can think all you want about how having more bubbles means your solution will undoubtedly be more aerated, but unfortunately science says otherwise. Only a very SMALL amount of oxygen can be dissolved in oxygen. It increases when the temperature decreases, so if you really want an aerated solution, you will have to buy a chiller as well. You can read about this here:http://www.engineeringtoolbox.com/air-solubility-water-d_639.html

theinhibitor said:

Sorry, not trying to be mean, but your personal opinion is wrong.
Actually, air pumps and massive bubblers are where people go overkill usually. You can think all you want about how having more bubbles means your solution will undoubtedly be more aerated, but unfortunately science says otherwise. Only a very SMALL amount of oxygen can be dissolved in oxygen. It increases when the temperature decreases, so if you really want an aerated solution, you will have to buy a chiller as well. You can read about this here:http://www.engineeringtoolbox.com/air-solubility-water-d_639.html

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I've used both small cheap fish tank pumps and the bigger pump. I have bigger, faster growing plants with less root problems with the higher vol. of air and bursting bubbles. I tried to read the link you posted but the link does not work.

There is definitely a point where you are sort of wasting energy because the plants can't really use all of the oxygen in the water especially when the levels are optimum but I would say that the pump your referencing is probably a bit much for just that tote with that little of water. On the other hand that pump would be great to have in the case that you plan to later use a larger res or you decided to run an additional res. YMMV but I have found the larger my reservoir the better my plants do so I would say if you ever plan on expanding, which we all do... I would go bigger... and hang the pump from the bungee they aren't that loud.
KnB

Someone recently did a dissolved O2 test around here. Results show that it is easy to reach maximum DO levels with 1 stone and it didn't matter which stone. Saturated is saturated.

That is totally not an overkill in my mind. I am currently doing a dry run of my setup, running the 950gph pump (sunleaves) just for the mixing res, a 10 gallon tote with 6 gallons of water. Then there is a 1440gph pump powering the two other 10 gallon totes (will eventually have two netpots per tote).

As for the noise, they are rather noisy (especially the 1440 gph model, it vibrates across a hard surface at an angle). Place the pumps on the floor and it can vibrate the entire room. The best way I have found is to suspend the air pumps using a rubber cord (BendBrewer mentioned this already). That way, the vibration is virtually eliminated and the noise after that is rather bearable. My guess is that I have already reached the point of diminishing return but I call that insurance policy should the res chiller break down on me.

pudge317 said:

I was thinking of up grading my air pump, but was wondering about the noise. Now I'm running a 60gal air pump tetra whisper, thinking bout going with a sunleaves durapump 950gph commercial pump. Using 18gal tote 8gal of water with 360 sprayers. Would that pump be overkill or not and could someone tell me if they are loud or noisy. Gonna remove the misters when roots hit the water.

Click to expand...