Can you over-skim a tank?

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I don’t think I can subscribe to the opinion that the skimmer isn’t doing anything at that moment so there for its broken or you are over skimming. The skimming load of the tank will change from day to night and each time you feed the tank will have an impact on waht comes out of the water. But I also believe that you can not skim everything out of the tank, that too is probably impossible but I have no data to prove or disprove that statement, only that any skimmer no matter how efficient it is at doing its job will not be processing all the water all the time. The statement “my answer is if you have NO head of foam your skimmer is not functioning like it is supposed to, now you have an over rated skimmer.” I believe would be like saying your car does not need 150 horse power because you only need 30 horse power to go the speed limit. Conditions change and some times you need more and some times you need less. I think I would argue that the skimmer is a bit over kill for a 70 gallon and you could definitely do well with a less powerful skimmer and get the same results for less power consumption.
 
here are the facts!!!! can you over skim???? NO!!!!
can you have a skimmer over rated for a tank??? yes!!!! will a 160 be to much for your 70 gal???NO!!!!!! plain and simple.....
 
Eric....you do Not have to up your feeding just because you have a bigger skimmer...you just dont have to be as concerned with over feeding is all...the skimmer will work well....Think of it like this....Horespower on a car.....you have 500 horsepower to play with...sometime you will use 100...sometimes 200...but if you need all 500...you got it...AC7AV..you really nailed it..great analogy....thanks for you input on this thread..
 
btw. a 160 aint gonna hang with 200gal sps tank.... i dont care what the air pull is...
that skimmer pulls way to much air for the body... it can'teven skim dry. it only pulls tea colored nog.... no that is it a bad thing but imo the skimmer pulls way to much air its not balanced where it is very productive... the pump is over kill for the body....
 
this all started with a simple comment by skimmer whisper you can over skim a tank lol most all of you agreed with him it is simple you cannot over skim a tank if you have an over rated skimmer it will still not over skim a tank it will simply not work like it is supposed to. but thats not common sense lmao.....
 
It sounds like the debate somewhat got off on the efficiency of a skimmer. And true you cannot overskim because you can not remove more than 100% of the organics. And all the water will not be in the skimmer at any one time. So to me the answer is yes you can overskim and you cant overskim. Depends on your tanks and your inhabitants and how you use your tank. I also look at a skimmer as working even when it is not producing skimmate, because for me the introduction of air(oxygen) into the water column is very important. I have a heavily stocked tank and when the skimmmer performs the function of an air pump injecting O2 in into the tank. And some skimmers provide circulation in the tank. Just a couple other things skimmers do.
 
ac7av said:
That’s a lot of information that my head is still spinning from the skimming.
Bottom line looks like you don’t always get what you pay for and you still need to do water changes no matter how big the skimmer.
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would it be spinning or bubbling lol

I agree you still have to do proper maintence on the system regardless. but will a skimmer over skim? plain and simple no way possible it can. these are people that build design and test skimmers not people that can do simple reading like us avg. folks. troylee builds skimmers I have one he built and soon to have another hehe. I know nothing and I will state that I know nothing of skimmers other then plug them in adjust and skime empty and now not over skimming. but I think 2 opinions are always better then one.
 
Shane and John said:
Eric....you do Not have to up your feeding just because you have a bigger skimmer...you just don't have to be as concerned with over feeding is all...the skimmer will work well....Think of it like this....Horespower on a car.....you have 500 horsepower to play with...sometime you will use 100...sometimes 200...but if you need all 500...you got it...AC7AV..you really nailed it..great analogy....thanks for you input on this thread..
Click to expand...

OK you need 500 once a month the other 30 days it is at idle doing nothing now thats a proper working skimmer? (not the skimmer is broke it is just not functioning as it was designed too) Please let me know this answer. because that is what I am understanding you are trying to say.

Eric with that analogy lol now do you want 500 horses working for you once a month, and the other 30 days sitting dormante... My guess is what Shane & john are saying if so by all means that will lead you in a bad direction. if this was the case for your skimmer I never owned a SWC skimmer so I cannot comment other then what I read from people using them. if you over feed your tank and the skimmer is pulling 30% where is the rest going if you over feed too much. waiting to be broke down for the one day a month. these are not set days just pointing out what they are getting too.

a bigger sump means more water volume more water volume means more water to be in contact with the skimmer. IMO a skimmer working around the clock is a good skimmer a skimmer working once a month is over rated and needs to be added to a bigger system with a bigger bio load. they are asking you to feed a shark in a 70 gallon system. lmao
 
lvsuckerfish said:
a bigger sump means more water volume more water volume means more water to be in contact with the skimmer. IMO a skimmer working around the clock is a good skimmer a skimmer working once a month is over rated and needs to be added to a bigger system with a bigger bio load. they are asking you to feed a shark in a 70 gallon system. lmao
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I think that a skimmer working once a month is an exaggeration but I get the point. The tests in the paper were for the most part 24 hour tests. One test was between two very different types over a month and testing for the un removable items that the skimmer leaves behind that cant be removed by this method. I think that most of our tanks work on a 24 hour cycle as far as the skimmer is concerned. There are times when I look at my skimmer and nothing is going on and other times it all of a sudden has 3 inches of junk in it in a short period of time. The skimmer doesn’t really take the food out of the tank and no one is implying to intentionally and blindly over feed the system. If you have a skimmer that works as you call it 24 hours a day 7 days a week pulling a constant amount out of the tank normal and desirable then let me ask a question. If we were to assume that that skimmer is doing its job removing the available to be removed by a skimmer matter from the water then how do we know it’s able to remove all or most of that available matter with out over skimming? For example, let’s say a skimmer X can remove 100ml of material from the water in a 24 hour period, the recurring available material in the water is being generated at a rate of 120ml per 24 hour. This is now a insufficient skimmer for this system. 20ml per day is being generated that the skimmer can not remove because of its specifications. But the skimmer is running constantly and at a predictable rate of 100ml per 24 hours and this does not mean it’s broken or working correctly, it just can’t keep up. You can do the math on the over rated skimmer but at that point the end result is you can remove nearly all that can be removed by the skimmer even though the skimmer is not always removing something from the water. As in the experiment there may be other benefits of the skimmer that was not being tested for in that article. Gas exchange and oxygenation of the water to name a couple would probably be increased by using the larger skimmer. If you only turned your skimmer on once a month it would not be working to do anything of benefit for the other 29 days of the month even if it was so over rated to be able to remove the entire months supply in one day.
 
ac7av said:
I think that a skimmer working once a month is an exaggeration but I get the point. The tests in the paper were for the most part 24 hour tests. One test was between two very different types over a month and testing for the un removable items that the skimmer leaves behind that cant be removed by this method. I think that most of our tanks work on a 24 hour cycle as far as the skimmer is concerned. There are times when I look at my skimmer and nothing is going on and other times it all of a sudden has 3 inches of junk in it in a short period of time. The skimmer doesn’t really take the food out of the tank and no one is implying to intentionally and blindly over feed the system. If you have a skimmer that works as you call it 24 hours a day 7 days a week pulling a constant amount out of the tank normal and desirable then let me ask a question. If we were to assume that that skimmer is doing its job removing the available to be removed by a skimmer matter from the water then how do we know it’s able to remove all or most of that available matter with out over skimming? For example, let’s say a skimmer X can remove 100ml of material from the water in a 24 hour period, the recurring available material in the water is being generated at a rate of 120ml per 24 hour. This is now a insufficient skimmer for this system. 20ml per day is being generated that the skimmer can not remove because of its specifications. But the skimmer is running constantly and at a predictable rate of 100ml per 24 hours and this does not mean it’s broken or working correctly, it just can’t keep up. You can do the math on the over rated skimmer but at that point the end result is you can remove nearly all that can be removed by the skimmer even though the skimmer is not always removing something from the water. As in the experiment there may be other benefits of the skimmer that was not being tested for in that article. Gas exchange and oxygenation of the water to name a couple would probably be increased by using the larger skimmer. If you only turned your skimmer on once a month it would not be working to do anything of benefit for the other 29 days of the month even if it was so over rated to be able to remove the entire months supply in one day.
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you stated in post number 14 to over feed.

if it can't keep up is it functioning properly? I would say No but you are saying yes? I am confused on that one.

if you can remove all you can from a skimmer where there is nothing going into the cup what are you removing?

I am not saying there is no over rated skimmers or under rated skimmers I am saying you can not over skim as Skimmer whisper stated prior. adding 02 in the water thats totally different. pulling skimmate out of the water is why we all buy skimmers right or wrong?
and for your question I would say yes if the skimmer is pulling 100ml a day and you are making 120ml a day you will still end up with 120 a day and 100 in the collection cup. but where are these numbers coming from just guesses. unless you are adding the 20's up to make 140 160 ect.... but 120 and pulling out 100 is good in my eyes. thats leaving something for the live stock to work on.

back and forth i said the same thing the over rated skimmer will work when it has enough organics to pull out of the system once a day once a month which ever lol

I only disagreed with over skimming lol over rated skimmers will not over skim!
 
wow....lol

mkay... ONE MORE TIME....

the thing that determins if you are overskimming or not is the LIVESTOCK people... basically if your corals are happy, then great! you are not overskimming. typically the only time there is a problem is with softies or lps in an overskimmed sps tank that arent getting fed enough or physically arent getting enough nutrients/DOM which some softies/lps do much better with.

and YES, a skimmer that doesnt have a stable foam head will still remove nutrients, especially an over rated skimmer, as long as it is pushing foam over the top at some point during the day/night. also, most of the protein we skim out is almost clear...it's the foods u feed that make skimmate dark or light.

and no one ever said that a skimmer will remove 100% of the nutrients, i personally said AVAILABLE nutrients

and i doubt elos would make products for replentishing DOM/nutrients from overskimming if you couldnt do it:
http://www.marinedepot.com/Elos_Pro...ish_Coral_Food-Elos_USA-EO2181-FIFDLI-vi.html
 
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“Protein Skimming” or “Foam Fractionation” is a process of removing Dissolved Organic Compounds (DOC’s) from seawater by way of ionic attraction and adhesion. DOC’s are ionically attracted to the surface of the tiny bubbles created by the skimmer pump or airstone.

As the bubbles rise in the skimmers “Reaction Chamber”, their surface becomes coated with these DOC’s and when they reach the top of the skimmer, they condense in a frothy head called “Foamate”, much like the billows of foam you might find on the seashore after a storm. The foamate is pushed over the “Neck” of the skimmer where is falls down into the "Cup" and liquefies (like beer when it over-foams in a glass). This concentrated liquid is called “Skimmate” and is a collection of DOC’s, algae, miscellaneous floating particles, and water.

The removal of this DOC’s is critical in providing optimal water quality in closed marine aquarium systems. If the skimmer is correctly sized for the system, it will be able to remove most if not all of the DOC’s before they become oxidized by nitrifying bacteria. Since the job of these bacteria is to convert DOC's into Ammonia, Nitrite, and Nitrate, subverting this process is ideal since the goal is to limit the accumulation of Nitrates and other toxins in the system.
The suppliments elos make are more for lazy people who do not replinish them with regular wc.... I agree it removes iodine/iodide etc. But all these things are replenished when you do regular wc so there is no need for all those suppliments...
A skimmer can only remove 30% of the docs in a tank the other 70 get dilluted by wc but still exsist.... There is certain things a bubble can't collect... In all acuallity you can't over skim but you can have a unbalanced system with a over rated skimmer that don't work all the time which therefore is a waiste of electricity and not efficiant....;)
 
I think what we will do is I will modify the sump and put it in to try it. I won't change our feeding habits which are 2-3 times a day with a mixture of different foods to keep everyone guessing whats for dinner tonight. Maybe we can try a timer to run it for a few hours a day:?:. If it struggles to consistently skim or create skimate and I can't get it adjust properly I will switch it back to the RS100 and hold onto the nice new one either for when we have a much heavier bio-load or for a tank upgrade when that happens. Come on... We all know it will :cool:. I already have a spot picked out for a 180 or 210 in the house. It just means some kids need to move out of the house to accommodate it :lol:. No rush at all for that though. I appreciate all the people who have chimed in and all the information that has been passed around over what I thought was a simple question. One thing this site never lacks is a group of passionate people willing to help at any time.
 
Sorry I guess I was typing the same time you were posting.

My opinion is use the skimmer.
 
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I'd definitly try and use it, I have an SWC extreme 120 on my little 20 gallon tank, and it does a wonderful job does it lose the foam head every now and again especially right after a water change, but other then that it does the job well. It's consistant I average about the same ammount of skimate every three days (1/2 the collection cup) I actually use it to guage my dosing and topoffs.

I dunno know why it does so well, I just read a ton of reviews on the skimmer and felt it would be the best purchase for my setup.

I put a few tickets into the raffle for the mini-s cone as well, if I would have won it I would have set it up on my 45 gallon cube without hesitation. (then slapped 500 gallons worth of corals into the flippin tank too).

as far as I'm concerned cleaner water just means more corals...


You could also go the route I would choose and name you existing tank "FRAG TANK" and work on #2
 
this skimmer is pulling junk off of bleached rock and a new set up rock was bleach for a little over a week. I did not feed the tank I didn't even have the lights up I think when I took this photo.

http://www.reeffrontiers.com/forums/showthread.php?t=54005

now I have the lights on and the skimate is black I will shoot another photo of it tomorrow when the sun is up. I am still not feeding the tank other then mb7 and vodka and stopped vodka after my little accident lol. but no food bleach and cured in tub rock this skimmer is pulling from inside the rocks I guess. I almost though it was over rated for my tank but pulling foam 24/7.

this is to show skimmers pull more then food to make a dark skim mate algea and others are also sucked up.

and the product from Elos you are better spending your money on selcon same ammino acids but added stuff. this I read also makes a skimmer go crazy when added to a tank.
 
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