Vortech vs Tunze

[Charlie's Angel]

I am looking for feedback and experience on these? Was dead set on Tunze, but like what I am reading about the Vortech.

[rpeeples]

I have the Tunzes 6100 / 7095 Controller. Love the ability to manipulate currents. Well built, bulky, pricey, and can be a little unsightly installed in your aquarium for the first time. These pumps do require a good cleaning about once every two months due to precipitation of calcium on the drive units. I think this exacerbated due to the use of Kalkwasser through my top-off unit. Again....this is only my feedback and not gospel. Hope this helps ya.

[Charlie's Angel]

Nevermind...I see that the Vortech could present some problems on a acrylic tank due to the heat it generates. I think I will stick with the Tunze.

[phishlet]

Vortech's beat the Tunze's hands down; especially with the new wireless controllers. Far less unsightly in the tank than the Tunze and not actual motor in the tank to generate heat or stray current. I've been running a pair on an acrylic tank for over a year now with no problem to the acrylic. Ecotech also supports placement on acrylic tanks.

[IPT]

I think it was more related to the thickness of the Acylic than Acrylic itself.

[sjm817]

I have a pair of 6100s and a 7095. I'll have a pair of Vortechs very soon. I'll post my thoughts once I try them out. I'm not expecting one to be hands down better than the other other. My primary concern with the Vortechs is noise. There are a lot of posts saying they are not quiet. I'm hoping that they are.

[taekim78]

I have both tunze (2X6100 anf 6200) and vortechs (2 X wireless). Tunze are dependable but it of a pain to clean and vortechs puts out tons of flow but they are bit noisy and the magnets inside them rust and have to be changed out every year or two (had to do this in mine). I never had a component failure on the tunze (i didn't clean them for over 6 months and its still going strong) but I did have both power supply go bad on me on the vortechs. HTH

[reef / aholic]

Tunze 6201 - 5,283gph verus VorTech - 3,000gph

Hold on fish!!!

[davocean]

I like the fact that you can put vortechs down low in tank w/out wires showing in tank, but wish you could aim them.
I'm pretty stoked w/ my tunzes

[d4a2n0k]

Ive had multiple Tunze Streams over the years and just picked up a Vortech to try on my 45. I was looking for controllable powerheads and have had nothing but problems with my nano-streams so didnt want the 6055's. Between broken clips, shafts coming out and just plain shoddy material I wasnt going the nano-stream route. The nano-streams are NOTHING like the full size streams and dont come close to the build quality of the originals. The originals Streams are way too big for a tank this size so the Vortech was what I went with with only the prop being in the tank. It actually takes up less room than my 6025 nano-streams in the tank.

On to the Vortech. I like the "cool" factor of them but prefer the Tunze 7095 multicontroller over the Vortech's wireless controller. Its easier to setup and more intuitive IMO. Not that the Vortechs controller is difficult to use in any way but it only has two buttons and the speed control dial whereas the Tunze controller has everything right there without having to hit the same buttons to get to the settings you want. The Tunze controller is also three times the size of the Vortechs so with those extra buttons and dials comes a much bigger package.

The Vortech's make an annoying sound. My tank is in my living room and you can clearly hear the pump ramping up and down in speed from 15 feet away. I have mine in Pulse mode with about 4 second intervals but in order to get it to produce waves, you have to pulse it very quickly and I would tear my hair out having to listen to this thing ramp up and down in speed every second. The other thing I dont like about it is the wire is an eyesore on the side of the tank. If you have a built in tank and can hide the motor block then this is much less of a concern. I know this is a feature of this pump with having the motor block on the outside but it also creates some problems....

The Tunze's take up much more real estate but are silent and I do like the controller better.

If I had a larger tank, I would go the Tunze route myself. They have been around for years and all the bugs have been worked out of them and most important to me is that they are silent.

IMO, all of these pumps use so little electricity that having the pump inside the tank makes no noticeable difference in heating the tanks up. I dont want to get blasted for this but I feel the Vortechs design is more of a gimmick than actually having any effect on the temperature. The motor block heats up so much that the surrounding glass in warm which obviously heats the water up as well.

As for performance, I feel the Vortech's have an edge on the equivelant Tunze (6100/6101) with a wider flow and creates a nice undertow that keeps the sand clean. This is where the Vortech's shine IMO and the fact that they cannot be pointed anywhere other than where the glass is facing makes no difference with the amount of water flow these things produce.

They both have pros and cons but I would suggest you read as much info as you can before making the leap. Theres more than enough info on both brands for you to see which is right for you.

[sjm817]

I hate seeing all these noisy Vortech posts. I have a strong feeling I'm not going to be happy with them. I'll know soon.

Is there a mode that is quiet?

[d4a2n0k]

Yeh, running them at 300 GPH makes them quiet.

[sjm817]

Great. Anyone looking for a nice unused set of Vortechs? Send me a PM.

[lewismw]

I have used the 6100 for 2 years now and love them. I had a minor problem that customer service handled with incredible speed and professionalism. I will always recommend Tunze after dealing with them directly. Plus the product consistently delivers what you are paying for .

[kdblove_99]

They both seem great and i have not owned either. But there is no way i would buy Vortech with an acyrlic tank.


My LFS store owner has a Vortech on his 300 display and i never noticed any noise from it

[HBtank]

The noise from the vortechs is only noticible at close to 100% and on pulse mode IME. The motor is far louder as it accelerates and deccelerates the magnets. When it is at a constant speed it really is far less, even at 100%. When closer to 70% or under on pulse the noise is far less as well.

The real reason this comes up is people running them at 100% on pulse. And I will admit there is noise.

On any other mode I do not notice them.

I prefer reefcrest mode and both my pumps as masters doing their own independant thing...

Both Tunze and vortechs are great. As mentioned I would research and weigh the factors.

For me it was simple. With Vortechs I got up to 85x turnover wth virtually no visual impact to the tank. that would have been impossible with Tunze and a real eyesore in my 80g.

I do wish that vortechs were quieter on pulse as I like the mode (without a wave) and I also wish that the controller was able to switch between modes on a timer....

[IanJ]

I have both Tunze and Vortech, for me it's Voretch every time. I have no noise issues with mine so far and they do create a much wider flow. As other say, they take up a lot less space in the tank, the wire on the outside i find no different to that of the wire coming out of the Tunze.
I can run the Vortech at full wack directly at the reef due to the wide and soft flow, i have to aim the Tunze at the glass unless i turn it right down.
When i was cleaning the Tunze pumps running them in a bucket overnight, i was surprised how warm the water had become, so living in a hot climate anything that reduces heat input is a real benefit.
I like the random reef crest setting.
Both are good pumps though.

[rishma]

sjm817 - The vortech noise may or may not be noticable to you. I find it is highly depending on ambient noise. I have a very quiet tank and I can hear the VT cycling in pulse mode because the noise is not consistent. On constant speed, my panaflo cooling fans will drown out the whirrr, and those a pretty quiet. So I suggest trying them before deciding.

[sjm817]

If it makes noise, it will be noticeable. My setup is extremely quiet since I have a basement sump. I'll try the pumps and make an honest assessment.

For visual, I expect the inside the tank will be better, outside will be worse. The Vortech is obviously smaller in the tank, and much larger on the outside. The small wire from my Tunzes is not at all noticeable the way I have them mounted. With the Vortech, one end of my tank is in view. The dry side and large wire that runs it will be very visible. The other end, not at all.

I hope they will get here today. I'll post back what I think of them.

[rishma]

Given your set-up, you will hear them. On pulse mode it will be noticable. Not so much on reef crest or lagoon but it is audible. I too have a very quiet tank (tomb quiet) and I am still deciding if VT is best option. Visually, they are much more pleasing in my 30x24x24 and the flow seems to be superior in terms of large volume low velocity. i find no need to aim them like the streams. The whole tank moves.

Basically I have to decide if the visual outweighs the audio considerations. I think for my small tank, the VT is the better choice. For a large tank (300 gal), I would probably go with the streams. I like both products, but neither one is perfect.

have fun.

[cstires]

I have a vortech on my 70g and it doesn't make any noise. Those of you that are having noise issues, are you sure the pump an propeller assembly are in alignment with each other? I did have noise until they were in proper alignment... Just a thought.

[rishma]

really? I have aligned them, I am certain. the noise is mostly from the dry side until I turn it to high speed, then there is some noise from the wet side.

Maybe I'll send it in. I only have 1 so it is hard to tell if the noise is normal. nobody I know has one for comparison.

[sfsuphysics]

I've noticed with my vortechs one is significantly noisier than the other, being as I bought them quite a few months apart one was the original the other came with a wireless driver, so it seems there might be some slight design issue involved with the added noise or that their manufacturing methods aren't very uniform across the board.

However at 75% of the total power it's almost dead silent, that being said it's ALMOST silent, so in a pulse mode it's not surprising that you're able to pick up on the sound differential, especially if it's in a visited room like a living room.

One thing I don't like about them is that you HAVE to buy them with a controller now, which tosses $75 onto the price, compared to a tunze, that's more expensive, however if you're using 2 or 3 pumps you don't have to decide if you want to continue to buy single controllers or a multicontroller. That being said I don't care for the wireless aspect, it's nice and all but apparently is severely limited in that it could have very easily gotten away with a wired version, so it seems more of a bragging point than a useful point.

If you have a large tank, with a thickness of 3/4" or over these are not for you though. Sure you can always build a dry box for them (see EcoTech/DIY forum for someone who has them), but do you want that extra bulk in your tank?

I think you could get away with either there are pros and cons to both. Thing is Tunze's 62xx stream is packed with lots of power that Vortech can't touch, so if you want massive flow (at a massive cost ) might want to go that route.

[sjm817]

Well, my Vortechs were shipped via covered wagon and finally arrived today. Here are my initial impressions:

My current pumps are Tunze 6100s with 6200 grilles (wider opening) and a 7095 controller.

Design:
The design is very simple. Easy to setup and get them up and running.
Cleaning the Coraline off the wet side would be a lot easier than the Tunzes. Not much there to clean.
The magnetic coupling is not as strong as I expected. The rubber on the dry side is "sticky" enough to keep the dry side from rotating.

Asthetics:
Pretty much what I expected. Nice small footprint inside the tank. Not so nice on the outside with the visible motorhead and large wire. These would be ideal for an inwall since you wouldn't see the dryside.

Flow:. Flow is very nice! It has a ton @ full speed....if you could run it there. I would rate that flow better than the Tunze 6100s I have with the 6200 grills.

Noise:
This is the issue. They are not quiet. Totally unacceptable @ full speed. This was my concern and it is true. The Tunzes are FAR quieter. At less than full speed, it is better, but still not sure they will be quiet enough. I'm playing around with the various modes to find a combination that would be tolerable

Controller. I like the Tunze 7095 a lot better. Buttons, dials, LEDs on the front where they are easy to see and get to. Why the multicolor LED? It would be better to have different LEDs or display to show the mode it is in.

I'll be playing with them the next few days and decide if I'll keep them.

[jamesdawson]

Nothing beats a Tunze oscillating on a WavySeas IMHO for randomized, chaotic flow with no dead spots. Waveboxes are fantastic also when used in conjunction.

Obviously very pricey and really not a good choice or even necessary on small tanks. Vortechs are very nice too, just not aimable.

James