A 750g SPS system is born

[dgasmd]

besides there is no such thing as a BK600 i am sure you like your new skimmer
there is a BK650 however, which is 26" in diameter will be hard to outskim i would say,

Heinz:

I know you are a die hard fan of BK skimmers, RD pumps, and such. To each its own. This is no competition in my mind at least. I have personally never owned a BK nor have I seen in one in action either, so any comments I may make are based on that.

I simply got what knowing what I know now and based on personal experience I felt was the better product for me personally. The day I see comprehensive good test and comparision of all different skimmers, I will switch if it shows there is better. Untilt hen, it is all opinions regardless of whose opinion it is.

krish75:

I am glad you enjoyed it. Hopefully you learned something from it as I have. Even if it is what not to do :lol: :lol: :lol:

 

[invincible569]

Heinz is definitely a hardcore BK person.

Alberto, how many watts does that pump consume?

 

[dgasmd]

Alberto, how many watts does that pump consume?

Which pump??? This skimmer is going to be fed 700-900 gph and will be powered by an air pump for the air stones. I don't know which air pump I will use yet.

 

[Heinz]

Alberto, i was just giving my 2 cents, this is no competition for me either

maybe i should put in my sig, "Disclaimer, die hard BK fan posting here"

 

[rufio173]

Yo Alberto,

My airtech 40 is pretty damn quiet. Sequence pumps are louder than the airtech airpump when you've got everything all hooked up, so sound shouldn't be an issue.

I know you were looking at the Alita, so let us know how that goes. Redeyereef really likes his SL56 (sweetwater brand) and he says he needs to put his ear pretty close to it to let him know it's working. I really think his is probably as loud as my pump, since they all have very similar decibel ratings. The alita also has similar decibel ratings so keep us up to date on the specs of the airpump that you choose.

Given the height of that skimmer and the amount of stones you want to drive, I'd go for the airtech 120 (or any of the countless and similar air pump brands there are out there that put out about that much air). I think a blower would be extremely loud and waaaay overkill. (Just for reference, the airtech 120 puts out about 120 liters of air per hour at a 2 meter depth... what I'd like to know is what tubing diameter they used to get at these numbers)

Peace,
John

 

[mojoreef]

My skimmer is pretty close in design and shape to alberto's. So I can speak from a bit of experence. This type of skimmer comes at skimming from the laws that govern protien skimming. As in it is designed to maximize dwell time for both water moles and air and has an outstanding bombardment rate, its pretty hard to match it on these aspects. In saying that a needle wheel is the next closest that I have tested coming from a commercally offered product.
Foam is not really an issue for my skimmer, I can produce it so it rises from 2 feet to 6 feet?? My has been running for close to a year now and I have only had to clean the stones once. The wet neck was a design I stole from a commercal skimmer and incorporated it into mine. Basically is pours a very very fine film of water down the inside of the neck wall. This creates a slicker interface for the foam to rise. It doesnt make or break the unit it just means that instead of cleaning it once a week you are good for about a month and a half.
As per skimate thats up to the user really, wetter skimmate comes out dark tea, dry comes out....well kind of solid. I always run wet.


Mike

 

[rufio173]

I made a mistake on airflow rates... the airtech 120 delivers about 120 L/min at 2 m depth, NOT 120 L/hr at 2 m.

Sorry about the confusion. That's alot of air. Haha

Peace,
John H.

 

[Heinz]

i do understand how a wetneck works, but never seen one working, i guess you took the desing from schuran ?

as for 6' high skimmer, isnt that something from the past ?

Deltec did some study and figured that wider is better then high, if i remember right, one of deltec europa posted about that, in one of Alberto's threads a while back,
a air bubble can only take so much, which gives the wider skimmer advantage, does not really matter if airstone or needlwheel,

 

[Travis]

Heinz, if you happen to have a link to the thread where Deltec Europa said that I would love to see what they had to say.

 

[dgasmd]

Any links to the airtech 120 pumps??

 

[mojoreef]

i do understand how a wetneck works, but never seen one working, i guess you took the desing from schuran ?

Thats right Heinz! not so much the design (I am not that good a craftsman) but the concept anyway.

as for 6' high skimmer, isnt that something from the past ?

I guess it depends on how much water you need to process, myself I have about 1200 so I am stuck with a large skimmer no matter what. Prior to making mine I did go shopping for something to handle my tank (and the way I run my tank) I had David pound me pretty hard to get one of his deltecs, but man I couldnt justify 4 to 5K. Mine ended up costing me around 600 bucks.

Deltec did some study and figured that wider is better then high, if i remember right, one of deltec europa posted about that, in one of Alberto's threads a while back,a air bubble can only take so much, which gives the wider skimmer advantage, does not really matter if airstone or needlwheel,

Width of the mixing chamber add to the compacity of the skimmer, which in turn adds to the skimmer dwell time for the water moles. Skimming in general is two basic princables. One is mechanical striping of the organics attached to the water moles. This is done by the air bubbles pounding into the water moles and stripping the organics that are attached to it. The more air bubbles the water mole has to pass the more of a beating it gets. This process is refered to as the bimbardment rate. The second process is the chemical attachment of the free organic to the surface of a clean air bubble surface. This process has to things you need to work well, one is as many clean air bubbles as you can have (usually about 20% of total water volume of the skimmer) so that thier is always surfaces available. The second is the right ammount of dwell time for both the air bubble and the water mole.
Organics just dont jump on the air bubble, most could never attach. What happens is the first organic to attach (surficants which live at the water/air interface) to the bubble, this changes the air bubble surface from clean to a surface covered with attached surficants, from here many more organics can attach themselves to the surficants that now cover the air bubbles. So this process takes a bit of time, thus making dwell time so important.
Anyway sorry for the ramble, we did a great thread on the process and the math behind it in Anthony's forum on RF, its called Skimming 101.


mike

 

[Heinz]

Heinz, if you happen to have a link to the thread where Deltec Europa said that I would love to see what they had to say.

Regarding contact time.
A bubble of air can only hold a certain amount of waste and once loaded no matter how high the skimmer column is will not hold any more. This is why smaller bubbles with a larger surface area are better.
Tall skimmers look impressive though, so they must be better and that is why they sell.

stuart bertram is from deltec europe,
is from this thread, http://reefcentral.com/forums/showthread.php?s=&threadid=332134&perpage=25&pagenumber=14

 

[Heinz]

Thats right Heinz! not so much the design (I am not that good a craftsman) but the concept anyway.

I guess it depends on how much water you need to process, myself I have about 1200 so I am stuck with a large skimmer no matter what. Prior to making mine I did go shopping for something to handle my tank (and the way I run my tank) I had David pound me pretty hard to get one of his deltecs, but man I couldnt justify 4 to 5K. Mine ended up costing me around 600 bucks.

Width of the mixing chamber add to the compacity of the skimmer, which in turn adds to the skimmer dwell time for the water moles. Skimming in general is two basic princables. One is mechanical striping of the organics attached to the water moles. This is done by the air bubbles pounding into the water moles and stripping the organics that are attached to it. The more air bubbles the water mole has to pass the more of a beating it gets. This process is refered to as the bimbardment rate. The second process is the chemical attachment of the free organic to the surface of a clean air bubble surface. This process has to things you need to work well, one is as many clean air bubbles as you can have (usually about 20% of total water volume of the skimmer) so that thier is always surfaces available. The second is the right ammount of dwell time for both the air bubble and the water mole.
Organics just dont jump on the air bubble, most could never attach. What happens is the first organic to attach (surficants which live at the water/air interface) to the bubble, this changes the air bubble surface from clean to a surface covered with attached surficants, from here many more organics can attach themselves to the surficants that now cover the air bubbles. So this process takes a bit of time, thus making dwell time so important.
Anyway sorry for the ramble, we did a great thread on the process and the math behind it in Anthony's forum on RF, its called Skimming 101.


mike

i do agree with you, and yes that is the basic of skimming, but what if all that is archived at a high of 3' ? and no more can be done after ?
my point is a skimmer 24"/3' is suppose to outperform a 12"/6' skimmer,
Deltec, H%S and RE is claiming this, i didnt do the testing or would i be able to, basicly just repeating what those companys claim,

 

[NaH2O]

i do agree with you, and yes that is the basic of skimming, but what if all that is archived at a high of 3' ? and no more can be done after ?
my point is a skimmer 24"/3' is suppose to outperform a 12"/6' skimmer,
Deltec, H%S and RE is claiming this, i didnt do the testing or would i be able to, basicly just repeating what those companys claim,

Heintz - if you want to, check out this thread (Mike mentioned): Skimming 101. You can find the math behind it.

 

[rufio173]

Any links to the airtech 120 pumps??

http://www.evolutionaqua.com/display.php?class_id=2&display_id=53

It'll run you around 100 watts to run it... Now that is energy efficient.

Peace,
John

 

[rufio173]

i do agree with you, and yes that is the basic of skimming, but what if all that is archived at a high of 3' ? and no more can be done after ?
my point is a skimmer 24"/3' is suppose to outperform a 12"/6' skimmer,
Deltec, H%S and RE is claiming this, i didnt do the testing or would i be able to, basicly just repeating what those companys claim,

Well, of course this will hold true since the 24" by 3' tube has twice the volume of the 12" by 6' tube.

Peace,
John H.

 

[Heinz]

it's obvious i am unable to bring my point over, so i will shut up now

 

[rufio173]

What I'd like to see is an equally sized airstone skimmer vs. a BK skimmer. Match airflows and see which one comes out on top.

Peace,
John H.

 

[invincible569]

iDeltec did some study and figured that wider is better then high,,

Wow Heinz I never knew... here is the quote:

"taller units have a much higher head of water above the pump and therefore require much more electrical power or more pumps to achieve the same amount of bubble generation at the greater head"

Im not sure how much of this is true. A tall skimmer has less width area for the bubbles to cover, while a wide skimmer has to take on more area. With a tall skimmer.. bubbles FLOAT up and does not require more electrical power. At the top of the tall skimmer.. you get bigger bubbles since all the small bubbles from the bottom have joined together through the entire journey from bottom to top. Maybe this is why Klaus claims finer bubbles in his BK?

 

[mojoreef]

Heinz

my point is a skimmer 24"/3' is suppose to outperform a 12"/6' skimmer,

I would imagine that thier is a chance this could happen but it would have alot to do with the design of the skimmer. The bombardment rate is a function of the amount of time the tank water spends in the mixing chamber and the width of the mixing tube, so yes a 24 inch tube would increase the bombardment rate as long as the water dwell time is good enough. The height of the skimmer would increase the contact time of both water and air, so these are truely two different but intrigal parts of the skimming process. Which one is more important?? they are both equally important.

A bubble of air can only hold a certain amount of waste and once loaded no matter how high the skimmer column is will not hold any more. This is why smaller bubbles with a larger surface area are better.

For sure, but the bubbles serve two purposes, one to mechanically strip and the other to chemically adhere.

it's obvious i am unable to bring my point over, so i will shut up now

Ok now you must still be in RC shock. No worries here good conversations are always welcome.

Edward

"taller units have a much higher head of water above the pump and therefore require much more electrical power or more pumps to achieve the same amount of bubble generation at the greater head"

Yes this would be true for a unit that required pump to create and drive bubbles.

A tall skimmer has less width area for the bubbles to cover, while a wide skimmer has to take on more area. With a tall skimmer.. bubbles FLOAT up and does not require more electrical power. At the top of the tall skimmer.. you get bigger bubbles since all the small bubbles from the bottom have joined together through the entire journey from bottom to top. Maybe this is why Klaus claims finer bubbles in his BK

If the correct ratio of air is used the bubbles should not meld together but stay fine all the way out. If you go beyond the percentage then you will hit a air saturation point and the bubbles will become larger.
Again its not just one thing but a number of factors that make a skimmer either skim properly or not. In the thread referenced thier is actual formulas that can be checked and matched up.


Mike