Reef Angel Forum

Does anyone else obsess about their tank noise?

For example, I woke up today and I have this random noise (like plastic hitting glass) and I CANNOT find what it is coming from!!! HAHAHA

I'm sitting here messing with coding and it's all i hear


I guess I'll go see what in the world it could be BUT i'm sure I won't be able to locate it...

Ouch... that can not be good...

nothing serious...just annoying it's like the sound of tapping a glass window????

My tank is located in our family room and I worked hard to get the noise down. I'm at the point now where the loudest part of the tank is the hum/whine of my MP-10 and WP-40 when I have the speed kicker up over 80%. All things considered it is a very quiet tank. The only time the pumps really bother anyone is if it's dead silent in the house. The good thing is that doesn't seem to happen very often with a 5 year old and 9 year old

About the clicking. I get that too. Usually late at night after the lights go off. I found one of my turbo snails was whipping his shell around a lot and if he's close to the glass it makes that clicking sound. Just like someone tapping on the glass with a pen or the like. I also have a pair of snapping shrimp that I can hear at night "clicking" their pinchers. That is usually just a single click where the snail makes more of a tapping sound.

~Charlie

It was consistent throughout the day but has resolved itself. Just odd. Lol. I also have a pistol shrimp but I'm used to his sound. Oh well. It's fixed and I'll not obsess on it anymore today. Hahaha

What return pumps do you all use?
I have a "Danner Mfg" mag pump (mag 7 or 9, I can't recall...) and it seems pretty noisy to me, but others say they are quiet-- so I'm not sure if I'm just more sensitive than other people, or if mine is particularly noisy. (Some people say the noise of their overflow is worse than their pump-- definitely not the case with me). Even running the pump by itself in a bucket is pretty noisy as far as I'm concerned.

I once spent two full days agonizing over tweaking my overflow pipe so that it's as quiet as possible, so the pump really annoys me. Can't bring myself to spend $150 to try an Eheim pump or something because I'm worried I'm just expecting quieter performance than is reasonable

Due to space constraints, only submersible or self-priming pumps are an option for me.

Mine is one I won in a raffle some years ago and I found it to be pretty quiet. Can't recall the name.. sorry
It's barely noticeable. My drain pipe makes more noise than the pump.
I'm due for cleaning and may do it this weekend... I'll check the mfg if I do so.
The skimmer makes more noise of them all.... lol

yeah, so it sounds like my pump is just really loud. The skimmer is not nearly as loud as the return pump... it's so nice and quiet during feeding

I'd be interested to know what yours is (and any other suggestions for quiet, submersible return pumps)

No clicking as depicted before. Lol. Just a random thing. Oh this fun hobby. I use a water blaster by reef octo. Super quiet!!!!

Noise was a big issue for me when I setup my current tank.

For wavemaking I decided between vortechs and tunze streams. I ended up going with a pair of tunze 7095s. Great little pumps.

For my return I got a tunze silence recirc pump. It's a DC pump at a very affordable price. Extremely quiet and being DC you can adjust the output as well.

The noisiest parts of my system is my return drain and skimmer air intake. The cabinet seems to help with that though.

I have a Danner Mag 9 and it does generate a little noise but it's not noticeable for me at all. It was worse when it was sitting on the glass bottom of my sump. I had to use a piece of kitchen drawer liner to act as a cushion in my sump to reduce the noise/vibrations. It's worked much better since I did that. Like others said, the overflow / drain pipes generate more noise. My skimmer (Octopus 150 i think) is noisy with it's air intake....had to position it to get it quieter.

It's funny, I isolated my Mag from the bottom of my sump with the same stuff.... between that and some softer hose it is *much* quieter than it used to be, but still loud enough to hear from outside the door to our apartment (the tank is 10' away from the door inside).

The Tunze Silence pumps look pretty amazing... I didn't know anyone even made DC aquarium circ pumps yet.

enigma32 wrote:The Tunze Silence pumps look pretty amazing... I didn't know anyone even made DC aquarium circ pumps yet.

I couldn't speak more highly of them. The actual motors are the same as the stream ones, infact it even uses the same tunze connector and is controllable. I've considered implementing something with the RA where the return throttles back after lights out. They also have large tall rubber feet (about 3cm) so don't need additional sound dampeners.

My tank is pretty quite now that I worked out the kinks lol

I have both a Danner Mag 7 & 9.5...they are extremely quite when only one is on but when both are on they hum together as they have the same resonance frequency. I ended up buying suction cups for the mag 7(as it has a plate for them to clip too) and I also bought one of those No-slip rubber pads for cellphones in cars that I placed under the mag 9.5 and now they're both quite haha. I did a bearing replacement on all 3 of my 3 year old MP10's that run at 90% and now they are quiet. So now the only sound I can't solve is water going through the overflow grates as it has a 2 inch drop that is padded by black sponges. Aside from that and the peristaltic ATO pump that runs every couple hours its nice and quiete.

Except of course the pistol shrimp popping, and hermits walking in the sand along the glass clanking away haha....the quest for a quiet tank

I would love to have the inhabitants be my noise issue

Also as far as a quiet, affordable pump goes, look into the SpeedWave DC pumps. I got the 5000 (lph) and it has 6 speed points along with a feed mode. Very very quiet (same body and such as the Waveline pumps). Would be awesome if that controller could be tied into the RA somehow, but don't think it's possible.

Don't loose all your hope...
I've got something cooking in the back burner. I just need to get my hands on the pump to confirm.

Is there anything I could do (since I don't have life in my tank yet) to help? If need be I could send out to you for a short bit. All I'm currently doing is cycling.

I sent you a PM, but all I need for now is some photos.
I'm waiting for a word from Chinese manufacturer, but no response yet.

Replied back. But will put here for others... It has the same connection that the Jebao WP-40 has (3 pins with the little bump and the threads for securing it). Power goes into the controller and then out to the pump via that cable. There are 6 speeds in the controller with a feed mode also (off for 10 mins).

Where the cable enters the pump is very sealed (so it seems) but I will get as many pictures as I can tonight when I get home from work.

This is not the same gravel that you used on your established tank, then I assume. It isnt by chance calcium carbonate or crushed seashell is it or Cichlid sand or similar?