Multiple Protein Skimmers

[aznt1217]

Starting up a new tank and am contemplating using 2 Aqua C Remora HOB Skimmers... for a FOWLR. Does having multiple protein skimmers help at all or is it useless???

I will have about 60 lbs. of LR in a 55 Gallon and 40 lbs. or so of live sand and 15 lbs crushed coral. I also will have Macroalgae in the tank (chaeto and others)

I mean the other two set ups for filtration I can think of is

Canister + Skimmer
Denitrator + Skimmer
Skimmer + Skimmer

 

[HHaase]

I'd step it up to a Remora Pro, but only have one skimmer. They take up more room than you think inside the tank, and a pair would be overly obtrusive... particularly with the overflow boxes. That, and for that setup a single should be more than sufficient.

I would pair that with two phosban reactors under the tank, plumbed like you would with a canister. Much more efficient with chemical filtration than a canister, and having two will let you run both GFO and carbon simulatiously.

-Hans

 

[tomtoothdoc]

55 gal. 48x13x20 ? what fish are you planning to have? need to take these factors into consideration: how many, size, active swimmer, messy eater, eats alot poops alot?

that being said,

lightly stocked with smallish & less waste producing fishes like say gobies, blennies, clowns, psuedos, then skimmer and canister should do.
i ran a fluval 405 without any mechanical filter foam, just chemipure and gfo in my seahorse tank for 3 years and that worked out well. should not get lazy with the canister maintenance though.

heavily stocked or messy eaters like lions, puffers, eels, then i'd go with denitrator and skimmer.(i'm researching for a denitrator myself). if you go with a canister, you'll end up cleaning it out on a weekly basis.

imo i don't see the benefit of 2 skimmers.

as far as phosban reactors, one for carbon and one for gfo, the carbon needs maintenace way before the gfo. that's why i rather go with chemipure and gfo in a canister. that way both gfo and chemipure get a rinsing at the same schedule/interval...... 2-3 weeks vs 1-2 weeks for carbon and 2-4 weeks for gfo. plus canister intake and out put are less cluttered than having another pump inside the tank.

that's my $0.02

 

[HHaase]

as far as phosban reactors, one for carbon and one for gfo, the carbon needs maintenace way before the gfo. that's why i rather go with chemipure and gfo in a canister. that way both gfo and chemipure get a rinsing at the same schedule/interval...... 2-3 weeks vs 1-2 weeks for carbon and 2-4 weeks for gfo. plus canister intake and out put are less cluttered than having another pump inside the tank.

that's my $0.02

I thought a chemi-pure baggie was carbon plus a smaller inner-baggie of resin? I used to do the exact same thing, 2 bags of chemi-pure in my canister. I just swapped it over to a lifereef overflow and sump a couple days ago.

-Hans

 

[CHEMCHEF]

My friend runs 3 remoras on a sumpless 120 and has great results. Not so great when he scaled back to 1 remora. So I think more is better

 

[Domboski]

If you need to run more than 1 skimmer your first skimmer is not adequate for your system.

I tried this by running two ASM G3's on a 100 gallon system. The first G3 would foam up normally but the second G3 just added oxygen to the water and increased my electric bill. The second G3 literally did not take anything from the water. The collection cup was always empty no matter what I did to dial it in.

This conflicts a little with Ken Feldmen's talk at the last fall swap regarding skimmer efficiency being at best 30% removal of TOC. Based on what he said there should be somewhere around 70% TOC in the water after it passes through one skimmer. In theory that means another skimmer should be able to remove another 30% out but it just does not work that way IME. I don't believe the actual make up of TOC is known so it is possible that maybe only 30% of TOC can be removed with the method a skimmer uses and the other 70% can not be removed with a skimmer but only by other means known such as GAC or even unknown or discovered yet.

Bottom line is buy 1 good skimmer and save money on the electric bill and time on maintenance.

 

[jrobbins]

and ditch the crushed coral for aragonite sand if you can

 

[aznt1217]

-Well I am only throwing up the idea of 2 skimmers because I might end up with a spare remora if I buy this other skimmer from a member. But thank you to everybody for the input. I think I will see how a single skimmer turns out before dropping money on another. If I do, it will be a recirculating skimmer.

-The canister filter idea doesn't seem to be going too well. I will definitely have a bag of Chemipure elite with the ferric oxide to help me out with phosphates.

-Not exactly sure about what I will be stocking with although I have tossed up some ideas. I really am looking at another denitrator because it seems to be working for my other tank.

-The crushed coral is going to be mixed in with Fiji Mud, Biosediment, and Tahitian fine sand-- for the purpose of the Macroalgaes I will be growing. I am only putting crushed coral in there to promote Copepod development due to the increased surface area and I will siphon the bed every so often. I know it could potentially be a nitrate trap, but if done right it shouldn't be a problem.

 

[aznt1217]

My friend runs 3 remoras on a sumpless 120 and has great results. Not so great when he scaled back to 1 remora. So I think more is better

How was the noise level? Did he have the prefilter box? I might just give it a shot and if it doesn't work you'll be seeing a spare remora on the Marketplace soon :shhh:

 

[CHEMCHEF]

He has them all modded. Hardly any noise