Skimmer Thread

[reefer-nyc]

Rich, the dude from Spain had it on a 100g. My tank is 90 gallon SPS with a 20 gallon sump. If it is rated for 200 my guess is cut it in half. Thanks for the info now only if the pump doesn't fry and if the folks reply I will be happy. The mini 200 model is a bit bigger and rated for more like 250.

 

[Pedro]

Ran into this older thread from Calfo that is a good read!

http://reefcentral.com/forums/showthread.php?threadid=554786&perpage=25&pagenumber=1

 

[fritz]

Famous post of Calfo's....
He mentions that the biggest misconception in reefing is that people assume all of their water is homogeneous, or that each drop has the same makeup. He states that unless your skimmer is fed via direct overflow water it's performance is greatly impeded because proteins float to the surface and do so very quickly. If you have an in sump skimmer fed via a pump sitting inside the sump you are NOT providing with protein laden water. In fact he says "just unplug it and save yourself on the electricity."

I'm a big fan of gravity feeding but why is Anthony one of the only people preaching this? Why are so many other skimmer manufacturers (90% maybe) making skimmers that require a pump sitting underwater? Is the entire skimming world at large ignorant to the behavior of proteins or is Anthony wrong/outdated in this post?

It seems that if this were truly accurate skimmer manufacturers would be making squat skimmers and INSISTING IN BOLD PRINT that you gravity feed in order to gain that last bit of efficiency out of their skimmer. Especially in a time like now when there are such fierce "skimmer wars" going on.

 

[jackson6745]

The crap my skimmer pulls out of my water, in correspondence with my water tests, tells me otherwise.

 

[meschaefer]

When I first got my DAS EX2, I was using it with a feed pump for a few months untill I was able to redo some of my plumbing. Once I redid the plumbing to have it feed directly from the overflow, I would estimate that it's efficiency doubled.

I was pulling out a much much darker skimmate

Here are before and after pictures. The first picture shows my skimmate before I plumbed it directly to the overflow. I am not sure how many days it had been skimming at that time, but it was probably about a weeks worth. The second picture shows about four days worth. I know it is not a lot of skimmate, but this is skimming a 65 gallon tank with only three fish smaller than two inches each.

 

[herman]

The crap my skimmer pulls out of my water, in correspondence with my water tests, tells me otherwise.

Youre just a irty man :sgrin:

 

[Pedro]

Well, Calfo said that really to be sarcastic. Further on he states that in fact it can work either way. The point being is that you want to give it the Rawest water possible. It doesn't necessarily have to be by gravity.

I think it's still a good read though in general. We have to take anything with a grain of salt.

 

[alrha]

is it normal for a skimmer to pull out tons of wet skimmate right after a water change?

 

[reefer-nyc]

Bubble King 180 from Germany in the USA in Action!!

Well it just came in from Germany ready to rock. Oddly enough so did the power inverter for up to 100w continuous. The skimmer looks awesome- quality seems to be A+. Funny that they call it the mini when it is the size of a small house! The cup is huge compared to my ER's in the past. The bubble size is tiny and now we wait for the breakin- you would think 1200 would get you some directions or something. Well, thank goodness the riser pipe comes off as I just made it fit. I have just a bit of room between the wall of the sump and the inlet of the red dragon. I have it adjusted to skim dry I believe and it just was plugged in with the inverter on delay with grounded connection. I will keep you all posted as it starts to pull crap out of my system after a few days. It is a bit noisy at first but I don't really care its in my office in the basement. Anyway here is a pic with the inverter. This is my last skimmer, I promise- twitch twitch.

 

[Tonyscoots84]

chris your opinion on the overpriced bubble king :lol2:

 

[cali_reef]

I would move that inverter out of the stand, away from water.

 

[Pedro]

I thought those red dragon pumps are supposed to be silent?

Well there's a lot of pressure riding on you, that BK better outskim all the cheaper ones here, LOL.

 

[cali_reef]

I thought those red dragon pumps are supposed to be silent?

I bet the needle wheel is not too happy spinning 20% faster.

 

[reefer-nyc]

Klaus tells me this is okay the way it is set up.

 

[Deanos]

Klaus does not have

where he is.

 

[fritz]

Don't listen to these haters. Keep us posted.

 

[loismustdie]

Didn't anyone guide him towards a BM? Cheaper, proven to be better than BK and best of all, NO RED DRAGON. I agree with Pierce. 2 out of 5 people I know with Red Dragons have had failures. That is worse than the failure rate of RIO. I can't see it doing well running 20% faster.

 

[Tonyscoots84]

thanks chris ...

 

[Pedro]

Fred, i'm not hating. Im just asking cuz i thought they were supposed to be silent, at least that was part of the selling point. That's all.

 

[fritz]

listen most expensive = best always. That's all anyone needs to know.

Seriously as a fan of "don't believe the hype" I'm really interested in how this does compared to a BM. BMs have had reliability issues in the past and I'm very curious to see how this performs. As Cali mentioned the extra speed may be a factor. In any event I too thought they were silent.

PLEASE KEEP US POSTED.