Willy
Well-known member
LOL even if she's a small person ...that is one HUGE skimmer
Skimmer discussion thread
- Thread starter krisfal
- Start date
Help Support Reef Aquarium & Tank Building Forum:
LOL even if she's a small person ...that is one HUGE skimmer
heres something i was wondering...
my skimmate can either fill the cup halfway in about a week of some dark nasty green or i can make it skim almost a cup a day of some really watery light green skimmate, which should i stick with?
my skimmate can either fill the cup halfway in about a week of some dark nasty green or i can make it skim almost a cup a day of some really watery light green skimmate, which should i stick with?
Kris,
Your 390gal tank has an in sump skimmer the last time I saw it. You also said, Bubble King skimmer was next on the list.
Are you looking for more info on BK or other similarly capacity skimmer?
If so, based on my searches on US, UK and German forum the lastest skimmers are per described by Skimmerwhisperer: recirculating cone shaped skimmer.
For a 400gal tank; pumps such as Air Star (ATB) or Red Dragon (BK) are appropriate. They are based on the Laguna pump with larger customed intake cover called volute. Mesh has better air water mixed tank needle recirc pump. They usually ship with both. BK seemed to have customed wind coil internals. But the goal of these pump would be high air to water ratio mix. Both are competent pumps. Low power consumption (watts) pump for the same amount of air-water mix i.e., very efficient.
Second would be the internal shape of the skimmer that "shapes" the water air mix upwards to the neck and collection cup. The larger BK has an internal cone that concentrates the air mix upwards. ATB has a cone shape that does the same thing with its internal wall.
If I have unlimited budget (less than $3k), I would get an ATB with Air star: Large in sump ATB. BK would be my second choice.
I DIY a small pyramid cone external recirc skimmer just to get the feel of the design. I can't afford ATB or BK skimmers. Hope this adds a piece to your skimmer puzzle.
Fred
Your 390gal tank has an in sump skimmer the last time I saw it. You also said, Bubble King skimmer was next on the list.
Are you looking for more info on BK or other similarly capacity skimmer?
If so, based on my searches on US, UK and German forum the lastest skimmers are per described by Skimmerwhisperer: recirculating cone shaped skimmer.
For a 400gal tank; pumps such as Air Star (ATB) or Red Dragon (BK) are appropriate. They are based on the Laguna pump with larger customed intake cover called volute. Mesh has better air water mixed tank needle recirc pump. They usually ship with both. BK seemed to have customed wind coil internals. But the goal of these pump would be high air to water ratio mix. Both are competent pumps. Low power consumption (watts) pump for the same amount of air-water mix i.e., very efficient.
Second would be the internal shape of the skimmer that "shapes" the water air mix upwards to the neck and collection cup. The larger BK has an internal cone that concentrates the air mix upwards. ATB has a cone shape that does the same thing with its internal wall.
If I have unlimited budget (less than $3k), I would get an ATB with Air star: Large in sump ATB. BK would be my second choice.
I DIY a small pyramid cone external recirc skimmer just to get the feel of the design. I can't afford ATB or BK skimmers. Hope this adds a piece to your skimmer puzzle.
Fred
krisfal
Well-known member
I am just looking at all options, spending this kind of money I want to make the right choice. I also need something that will aggressively skim my tank because I like to feed my fish well (3-4 meals a day).
Plus as with everything else along the way I like to learn what I am doing.
I saw a few new cones skimmers from SWC & WM. But, going with the cones; I am not sure if they carry the capacity that you need. Maybe, the SWC & WM can chime in. These are so new that I can't seem to google them on the any forums besides the announcement of their lines and features. Owners of these skimmers should chime in as well.
ATBs cones have been in prototype to production for a couple of years. It ranges in from small to XL and the ones shown above with the girl is XXL. They also have a tall version. Similarly for BK.
For 400gal with heavy load the options for cone skimmers are limited to a few manufacturer.
Cone recirc with bubble plate skimmers are the latest energy efficient "green" skimmer IMHO.
Price is high. For a small ATB the price is about $948. That makes the SWC ($800?) and WM ($699?) competitive.
ATBs cones have been in prototype to production for a couple of years. It ranges in from small to XL and the ones shown above with the girl is XXL. They also have a tall version. Similarly for BK.
For 400gal with heavy load the options for cone skimmers are limited to a few manufacturer.
Cone recirc with bubble plate skimmers are the latest energy efficient "green" skimmer IMHO.
Price is high. For a small ATB the price is about $948. That makes the SWC ($800?) and WM ($699?) competitive.
krisfal
Well-known member
krisfal
Well-known member
So just found this for sale:
have a H&S 250 Int. 2x1260 for sale. The skimmer is 4 months old.
Could save me enough that I could wait a couple of years for the Cones to come down in price.
I think it is big enough for my system. Thoughts, opinions?
have a H&S 250 Int. 2x1260 for sale. The skimmer is 4 months old.
Could save me enough that I could wait a couple of years for the Cones to come down in price.
I think it is big enough for my system. Thoughts, opinions?
Isn't it alwaysJust thought a new thread might be better than renewing an old one!
Hey, all we are doing is adding to the volumes of good info here.
I generally like to get inbetween these two. Not super watery but not sludge black sewage. I usually pull a dark brown watery skimmate. Reason i do this is because it doesn't gunk up the neck as quickly and it is pulling out more by skimming a bit on the wet side.
My .02 on skimmers. There is so much to take in when you look at skimmers. Design, size, neck diameter, transition to neck, bubble plate, input from pump, standpipe....etc and thats not even looking at the pump. The transitional cylinder NW skimmer is an easy skimmer to talk about. Look at the ER's, Deltec's, Octo's from a few yrs ago. They were great skimmers for there time. They were pretty simple designs as well. A decent design, nice size body and decent pump (some anyhow) Now the newer skimmer designs all have bubble plates and most like the msx/octo extreme have enlarged neck's and better body to neck transitions, almost like cone's. Now the design has gone one step further and made a cone skimmer. Easily the smoothest design out there. Just for the simple fact there's no transition, less backpressure on pump's so they can work like an unrestricted pump.
Now the ratings are different between the cone's and traditional cylinders. I generally run a 4-6-8lph air per gallon of water for a well designed skimmer. So a skimmer pulling 600lph air is good for a 100g tank with a medium bioload. Now when it comes to the cone's I'd go with a 1.5x's higher rating so a 600lph air is good for a 150g tank.
For example for air pull cylinder vs cone. The octo pro 300 pulls 70scfh of air or roughly 2000lph air and 600gph waterflow. Pretty unbelievable imo. I'd rate this at a good 333g tank with a medium bioload. But i'd rank this pump on a cone skimmer at 500g on a med bioload.
The pump's out there right now that are some of the best are the sicce psk2500 as its the cheapest pump that will pull from 900lph -1400lph air and only pull 350-450gph water flow at 17-30w. WM has done a great thing with the sedra 9000's giving them around 1100-1200lph air at around 40-50w. The airstar, laguna maxflo 1500, Red dragon, askoll 1500 are all the same motor block and all pull 50-80scfh or 1400-2266lph air at around 50-60w. The octo pro 300 i'm running is pulling 75scfh at 57w hooked up to the skimmer. The askoll pump's are THE BEST pump's out imo.
Now for the impeller's and bubble size. There's three different impeller's out, the NW-needlwheel, pw-pinwheel and mw-meshwheel. And they break down the bubbles smaller and smaller. The nw being the least effective and meshwheel making the air bubbles teh smallest. I prefer the PW as there's no maintenece required and your getting very fine bubble size and don't have to worry about any start up probs like you do with mesh. The smaller the bubble size, the more surface area the bubbles have to bond with doc's to produce skimmate.
Dwell time......well this is the toughest thing to challenge imo as far as skimming goes. The recirculating vs in sump skimmer challenge. Well, with the newer pump's that pull so much air and so little water are the recirculating skimmers that much more effective? WIth the older skimmers using genx4100's and otp 3000's sure using a feed pump of 300gph vs 1000gph water flow it makes since. But now with a sicce pushing only 350-450gph or an askoll pushing 600gph do you really need to have a recirc? Maybe if you had 2-3 sicce's or two askoll's it would benifit you. As for dwell time, thats very controversial. It use to be a 2min dwell time. Not sure where this # came from, just kinda spawned out of no where imo. Dwell time is important but not so much as were looking to recycle this water over and over. Push the water through and give it some contact time with the air and push it out and bring in some new water. No since in keeping it in the reaction chamber to long as the water can only be stripped so much.
Pretty generic skimmer thoughts but I will be happy to explain anything further if you would like.
Now the ratings are different between the cone's and traditional cylinders. I generally run a 4-6-8lph air per gallon of water for a well designed skimmer. So a skimmer pulling 600lph air is good for a 100g tank with a medium bioload. Now when it comes to the cone's I'd go with a 1.5x's higher rating so a 600lph air is good for a 150g tank.
For example for air pull cylinder vs cone. The octo pro 300 pulls 70scfh of air or roughly 2000lph air and 600gph waterflow. Pretty unbelievable imo. I'd rate this at a good 333g tank with a medium bioload. But i'd rank this pump on a cone skimmer at 500g on a med bioload.
The pump's out there right now that are some of the best are the sicce psk2500 as its the cheapest pump that will pull from 900lph -1400lph air and only pull 350-450gph water flow at 17-30w. WM has done a great thing with the sedra 9000's giving them around 1100-1200lph air at around 40-50w. The airstar, laguna maxflo 1500, Red dragon, askoll 1500 are all the same motor block and all pull 50-80scfh or 1400-2266lph air at around 50-60w. The octo pro 300 i'm running is pulling 75scfh at 57w hooked up to the skimmer. The askoll pump's are THE BEST pump's out imo.
Now for the impeller's and bubble size. There's three different impeller's out, the NW-needlwheel, pw-pinwheel and mw-meshwheel. And they break down the bubbles smaller and smaller. The nw being the least effective and meshwheel making the air bubbles teh smallest. I prefer the PW as there's no maintenece required and your getting very fine bubble size and don't have to worry about any start up probs like you do with mesh. The smaller the bubble size, the more surface area the bubbles have to bond with doc's to produce skimmate.
Dwell time......well this is the toughest thing to challenge imo as far as skimming goes. The recirculating vs in sump skimmer challenge. Well, with the newer pump's that pull so much air and so little water are the recirculating skimmers that much more effective? WIth the older skimmers using genx4100's and otp 3000's sure using a feed pump of 300gph vs 1000gph water flow it makes since. But now with a sicce pushing only 350-450gph or an askoll pushing 600gph do you really need to have a recirc? Maybe if you had 2-3 sicce's or two askoll's it would benifit you. As for dwell time, thats very controversial. It use to be a 2min dwell time. Not sure where this # came from, just kinda spawned out of no where imo. Dwell time is important but not so much as were looking to recycle this water over and over. Push the water through and give it some contact time with the air and push it out and bring in some new water. No since in keeping it in the reaction chamber to long as the water can only be stripped so much.
Pretty generic skimmer thoughts but I will be happy to explain anything further if you would like.
Now on skimmer recomendations here's my thoughts. For a budget cheapest skimmer out there that will perform my recomendations are: Octo nw's, bubble magnus(AB version only), Vertex skimmers.
Best budget skimmers: SWC/MSX extreme's. Not the Coralvue versions as the pump's don't pull even close to the air the MSX versions do. The das ex skimmers are nice recirc's that are good budget skimmers as well.
Mid level skimmers: Hands down the octo pro 300 with askoll 1500 pump. Alot of people have been talking about the octo pro 250 with the askoll 1500. Not a good idea unless you restrict the air pull. Just spend the extra hundred bux.
Higher end skimmers: SWC Cone and all Warner marine skimmers. Very nice skimmers and you get what you pay for here. The reeflo's are nice, but not very efficient at all.
Premium skimmers: ATBs are excellent and the only skimmer worth there money this high up imo.
And this doesn't mean your skimmer doesnt work well by any means, just my thoughts and suggestions. And remember that every tank has a different requirement.
Best budget skimmers: SWC/MSX extreme's. Not the Coralvue versions as the pump's don't pull even close to the air the MSX versions do. The das ex skimmers are nice recirc's that are good budget skimmers as well.
Mid level skimmers: Hands down the octo pro 300 with askoll 1500 pump. Alot of people have been talking about the octo pro 250 with the askoll 1500. Not a good idea unless you restrict the air pull. Just spend the extra hundred bux.
Higher end skimmers: SWC Cone and all Warner marine skimmers. Very nice skimmers and you get what you pay for here. The reeflo's are nice, but not very efficient at all.
Premium skimmers: ATBs are excellent and the only skimmer worth there money this high up imo.
And this doesn't mean your skimmer doesnt work well by any means, just my thoughts and suggestions. And remember that every tank has a different requirement.
DonW
R.I.P.
Besides the ATB which ones of these skimmers is actually on the market and shipping? Are there any threads showing tanks and the skimmers in action?
Don
Don
Korallenzucht Skimmer
All of them are on the market and shipping except the K-1 by WM. I've seen quite a few pics of all in action except the SWC cone. Only seen a few pics in action. I'll see if i can find them. I've got plenty of msx and octo pro pics myself.
DonW
R.I.P.
Skimmy
SKIM FU
yeah, i dislike that thing too...
even though it's a cone,
it's just a lame modded beckett, imo
i only mention them because they were the first readily available cone
