I'm collecting equipment to set up my 2nd planted aquarium. I have a 75 gallon tank that I plan to run two XP3's on, one at each end of the tank. Right now my 26 gallon bowfront is running one XP3 with an in-tank heater. My goal on this set-up is to keep as much equipment out of the tank as possible.

Does adding the Hydor on the outlet reduce flow? Would a 300W be sufficient or should I run two, one on each XP3?

I haven't settled on what media I will run in the filters yet. I was considering using one sponge, Purigen, some type of polishing media (Rena Micropad) and a Hydor heater on one of the filters to keep the flow up. The 2nd XP3 I was planning on maybe two sponges, some type of biofilter media, stars or something and an external C02 reactor. If I add a second Hydor on this filter, would I be losing much flow?

My 26 gallon tank has nothing in-line on the outlet so I have no experience attaching anything inline to the XP3, and the impact to the flow.

I have an external CO2 reactor in the return line from my XP3, and I couldn't detect any flow reduction when I first set it up. I'm sure there is some reduction, but it must be small. I don't have any experience with Hydor heaters though.

Hoppy,

So you use in tank heaters on your tanks?

Mike

I have a Hydor 200 installed recently and all I can say is it workes pretty good with only 0,3° C between ON and Off. There must be some flow reduction but it seems to be very little.

Best regards,
Detlef

I have 2 of them, for the smaller tanks I have.
I know they reduce the flow some, but as said, not much.

I'd place one on each Canister rather than 2 in line which is not efficient(only one will really work that way).

Regards,
Tom Barr

At the moment I'm not using any heater at all. I let the lights heat up the water a little during the day, then rely on the thermal mass of the water to hold a high enough temperature during the night. When I used a heater, actually a couple of them at different times, they would not set a temperature that I wanted. My tank kept running at 80F or more, with the heater refusing to shut off. I avoided a disaster only because I refuse to use big heaters, preferring to experience somewhat high temperatures with heater thermostat failure rather than making fish stew.

Thanks for the input guys!

Tom, you mention that you use two of them on your smaller tanks. Are these not as efficient as in-tank heaters? I run my 26 gal with an in-tank heater and keep the temp around 77. I have two toddlers, so I do not let the house temp drop below 69-70 in the winter. Do you think I can keep my 75 gallon stable with a 300w on each cannister?

75 gallons of water is going to be pretty stable in temperature no matter what you do. It takes a lot of energy to raise or reduce the temperature of that much water, and whatever change happens will be slow. Of course if you don't keep the room the tank is in heated to 70 F or so, it is possible that the temperature will eventually drop too much. I just keep my rooms around 66 to 75F year around.