skimmer question

[brady816]

I have a 55 gal saltwater tank it has been running for 2 weeks now. I have 20 pounds of live rock and crushed coral. My question is how soon do i need to get the skimmer? And would i be ok with getting one from petsmart or pet co? I was at inland aquatics they were selling a cpr bak pak for 189.00. The one from pet co was 100.00. Im going to have a fuzzy dwarf lion and thats it.

Thanks alot

 

[Krish]

Welcome to RF Brady!! If it were me, I'd get the skimmer going as soon as you can. Some people are against skimmers and then there are those who'd never be caught without one. As for buying from Petsmart or Petco, I couldn't say...I've never seen anything in either of them I'd personally use (especially Seaclone). The CPR backpack, I've never had any experience with so I couldn't comment on that either...Hopefully someone will chime in real soon with some more info. Hope you enjoy your time here and find out all the info you are looking for

 

[DonW]

If your only choices had to be the seaclone or the cpr I'd go with the cpr. Much higher quality.

Don

 

[brady816]

this person was telling me that take the bio wheel out of the emperor 400 with the bio wheel filtration system its going to cause me problems

 

[chris&barb]

i would look into the ASM mini or G1 or a coralife supper skimmer

http://www.asmskimmer.com/catalog/index.php?osCsid=4c880fd53aea4f0ff3cd391820d10c35

http://www.marinedepot.com/aquarium...super_needle_wheel_venturi_system.asp?CartId=

also if your not going to have corals then i dont think the bio-wheels will do any harm

 

[Krish]

this person was telling me that take the bio wheel out of the emperor 400 with the bio wheel filtration system its going to cause me problems

The reason why bio-wheels are said to be "bad" is because they have no way of ridding the tank of nitrates. They are great at converting ammonia to nitrite and nitrite to nitrate, but it ends there so if you have a tank that has high levels of nitrates, you will end up with nuicance algae issues and it will affect corals etc. Fish can handle a pretty good amount of nitrates, but corals don't do so well...

 

[brady816]

im not going to have any corals just the live rock i have and then the lion fish and thats it.

 

[WesA]

Hi Brady,

Many may disagree with me but unless you are going to have animals in your tank, it is less important to have a protien skimmer. Your live rock will stay relatively clean depending on where you got it from so it shouldn't produce much waist and one lion fish isn't going to pollute much of a 55 gallon tank either.

If it were me, i'd toss the bio-wheel as recommended and set up a wet-dry filter just like you would for standard salt-water tanks. If you change your mind later and want to add animals, you can spend your money on a skimmer later. Of course, then you are going to have to figure out what to do with that lion fish. ;-)

My two cents,

BTW, make sure you tanks is fully cycled before adding that fish!

Wes