DIY wave maker?

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yetee

Aquarium Advice Activist
Joined
Apr 8, 2008
Messages
189
Location
Salt Lake, Utah
So has anyone ever thought of making a oscillating wave maker system? my idea is to use Hydors with a bracket that mounts to the top of it that has a shaft that goes to the top of the tank into an oscillating gearbox driven by a small motor. in essence it would be like an oscillating fan but it would rotate the power head back and forth. just a thought. I have access to a cnc and laser that I can make parts for it all.

This would eliminate the expense of wavemakers and the noise of turning powerheads on and off.
 
Ok I think I have decided to go through with it. the only thing to decide now is do I do two of them or just one? I just got my power heads today. got them off ebay for ~$13 each. (they are the hydor knockoffs, taking my chances).

packaging was trashed when I got them
img_1095744_0_93902b86ae633f2231ef1d25ca1943b2.jpg


but I checked them out and they run great, nice and quiet. They are 800gph each and only pull 6w, dont have a multimeter here so I cant check to make sure though.
img_1095744_1_cb48e5cb8e6d2d822d5e6182f6f6e5c5.jpg

They came with suction cup mounts but I am not going to use them, I will use a mount system that I will make.

here is a rough drawing of how the gear box will work.
img_1095744_2_0283596fa130bee21a2cf0b5905ad82c.jpg

I will be able to adjust it from 16% 25% and 60% oscillations. the small gear will be attached to a rod that mounts to the powerhead, and the large cam will be attached to a very small motor.

any sugestions on any of this?

I need to re-draw the gears a little but the over all idea is there I think.
 
Go for it. Sounds like a plan. I will be tagging along to see how it turns out.
Good luck on the project.
 
thanks for tagging along. So I re-designed a little bit and I think I have come up with the design for it all. I wasnt thinking in the first design and after tracing the path of the cam the arm cannot be kept in place with a regular stationary block, would have to use springs and stuff so this should work now. now just to get it cut out and put together. I think I have found a motor for it as well. its a small DC motor that is geared down to 5 RPMs, this will make the wave maker go left to right in about 6 seconds. I might gear it down a little bit more but 6 seconds is pretty slow.

Here is the new design.
img_1096204_0_a308da362f3e1a9a1e367fa54649470c.jpg


to give you an idea of how the model works.
Cyan is the bottom layer
Black is the middle layer
Red is the top layer
Green are engraved
And magenta are holes that go through every layer for screws
 
Common Names: Volitan, Antennata, Radiata, Dwarf Zebra, Fuzzy Dwarf, Fu Manchu (not an all inclusive list, just the more commonly found names in the hobby species)
 
^^ ^^ huh? guessing wrong topic?

Just as an update I havn't given up haha I have been busy and havn't had a chance to cut everything out. Finally got the vacume system set up for our laser and it should be all cut out this weekend.
 
You may want to round out the end before getting to the wheel. You are going to have a lot of up/down movement of that 2nd part going from the gear shaft to the part that connects to the wheel.

Well, I know what I want to say, just not sure if I'm saying it right.

Is this going inside the tank or outside?
 
you will have to clarify that, I am not really sure what part you are talking about.

this will be outside the tank, it will sit on top of the tank and a shaft will go down and mount to the power head. the tank is acrylic so it will have a good flat surface to mount to on the top.
 
Well... I'm not sure how to describe it. Have been thinking but not sure. I'll just wait and see how it turns out as you may already be doing what I think.
 
I think I see what Smitty is talking about. Here is a very quick very bad drawing but I think it will work. What I see is when your drive wheel is in this position the connecting arm will hit against the housing of your gear box (the red lines). so you may have to widen the housing at this point other wise looks good looking forward to the out come.

Wayne
 

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How big is your tank why do you need a wave maker? Just put on some strong water blower I think it will do the trick.

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