Bored! So lets design a Skimmer!

[wanareef]

Well, it's been a while, but finally heated up a piece of acrylic for my little cone that leads to the neck and the cup

Boss Hogg air stone, not sitting on the rack

That white metal is a 4' shop light

 

[Blackwolf_nl]

hi wanareef

can you tell me how you have make that cone piece

I wane try to make me here also a BIG skimmer ( tank = 265 gallon)


Blackwolf

 

[mojoreef]

Hiya Blackwolf !!

To make a cone shape like that you have to thermal form it. The way we do it is to create a jig that hold a large acrylic circle, you then place it into an oven (we made ours) in our case we bend 1/4 acrylic so I believe its 45 minutes @ 345 degree's, from their we take it out and place it onto another jig that allows us to press it into a cone shape. After a few hours at a slow and normal cooling you take the cone shape and route it so you can make it somewhat to the shape shown above and ready to be glued to a tube. Their are other ways but that is how I do it.

Looking good wanareef!!!! now get that puppy running

 

[Blackwolf_nl]

hee mojoreef

tnxss, i gone try it ...............
keep my fingers crossed hahaha
when it is done ( and done good ) i place some pics from the cone

 

[wanareef]

It's alive - finally

Been running for about a week and a couple of days and it's started to break in. Just some pix's of the great froffy goodness it's pulling out. The recirc bio-pellet reactor is tied to the feed pump as well, it's a mag 5 pushing water about 15ft with about 6ft of head, almost trickling into the skimmer near the top of the bubble column

bubble column

the Boss Hogg ceramic stone

Next will be a skimate collection "bucket" with a sensor to call/page me, thru my Apex, to empty the smelly stuff when it gets partially full.

 

[Peppie]

Dont you just LOVE IT when great executed plan comes together??

Fantastic job!!! Thanks for the update.

 

[mercenary-grunt]

wow looks good. thats a big skimmer for a 245g tank.

Sent from my Galaxy S3 using Tapatalk 2.

 

[russ4h]

A few pages back, mojo describes converting a section of your sump into the skimmer. Would anybody be able to provide some more detail into accomplishing that? Perhaps using the boss hog air difuser and so forth. Thanks. I signed up just because of this thread, btw. It was a great read.

 

[Peppie]

A few pages back, mojo describes converting a section of your sump into the skimmer. Would anybody be able to provide some more detail into accomplishing that? Perhaps using the boss hog air difuser and so forth. Thanks. I signed up just because of this thread, btw. It was a great read.

Can you give a post# ???
I think I may know what he has in mind.

 

[russ4h]

It was post #144 back on page 10.

 

[kpiotrowski]

Well you know what, we could get real simple though??? What if you would just take a compartment in your sump?? then walled, put a solid plate of acrylic on top of it, then just cut a hole in the top of that compartment, slide your old skimmer tube and cup into it with a little glue?? The drop in this puppy with an air pump and feed it off the drain line?? And they do have a 2 1/2 x 12 also


No no No that would be way to simplistic and way to cheap right?? lol


Food for thought?


Mojo

def food for thought!

 

[russ4h]

Definitely! I would like to do exactly that but I just need a visual of how it would all work. I would also like to incorporate the boss hog that is talked about instead of the diffuser referenced in the post.

 

[Peppie]

Definitely! I would like to do exactly that but I just need a visual of how it would all work. I would also like to incorporate the boss hog that is talked about instead of the diffuser referenced in the post.

You are looking to build an Air Driven Counter Current skimmer.. Goggle that. It will give you lots of pictures.

 

[russ4h]

You are looking to build an Air Driven Counter Current skimmer.. Goggle that. It will give you lots of pictures.

So I could feed directly from my herbie overflow line (fed into the top of the chamber), have an air diffuser powered by an air pump (at bottom of chamber) and just drill a hole for the water to drain at the bottom? is it that simple?

 

[kpiotrowski]

So I could feed directly from my herbie overflow line (fed into the top of the chamber), have an air diffuser powered by an air pump (at bottom of chamber) and just drill a hole for the water to drain at the bottom? is it that simple?

there is some math of how big of a reaction chamber you should have vs gph of flow, and then there is the consideration of ease of cleaning and maintainance and collection & removal of skimmate which is actually more complicated. store bought skimmers have the advantage there with being able to pull off cup and take it to the sink and done in 2 min. and also fabrication of cones and tubes with nice clean edges and tapers is had for most DIY, but yeah and airstone and a pump will create foam right?

 

[Peppie]

So I could feed directly from my herbie overflow line (fed into the top of the chamber), have an air diffuser powered by an air pump (at bottom of chamber) and just drill a hole for the water to drain at the bottom? is it that simple?

You will need to regulate the water exiting the skimmer. Use a gate valve. Just be sure that the height of the exit plumbing is lower than the water entrance.