Skimmer size debate!!??

[mcarroll]

It is best to get one that will turn over the your tank water volume at the same rate as your sump so that you are processing all the water thru your skimmer.

Bingo.

If you pay attention to guidelines from the more established skimmer makers, it works out this way in most cases.

Skimmer and sump flow roughly match at around 4x the display tank's volume. (Count livestock tanks, but not sump volume.)

It's a solid rule of thumb. (Is that an oxymoron? )

 

[madweazl]

Bingo.

If you pay attention to guidelines from the more established skimmer makers, it works out this way in most cases.

Skimmer and sump flow roughly match at around 4x the display tank's volume. (Count livestock tanks, but not sump volume.)

It's a solid rule of thumb. (Is that an oxymoron? )

Why wouldnt you account for sump volume?

 

[danielb333]

Is it possible to have high nitrate and a low bio load or do the both go hand in hand. When I was carbon dosing my skimmer was skimming pretty consistant. Now that I stopped it's more sporadic. Lots of micro bubbles but only occasionally foams. I tested my nitrate yesterday and it's at 15. Cleaning skimmer did not change out put of skimate.

 

[Michael43]

Personally I turn my tank over just about 10x. Not sure if that's bad. That what Red Sea recommends so I did it

 

[JoseNovoa]

I've always oversized my skimmer in every tank I ever owned, I like my reefs with lots of fish, so I need constant nutrient export, specially when it's an sps dominated tank, I tend to have better color and a bit slow growth, but I like it that way

 

[saltyphish]

I need to state that I suffer from Tim the Toolman Taylor syndrome....bigger is always better. I ran an MRC 3 on a 90 gallon tank, and it was the best skimmer I owned....if you could put up with the noise. I don't believe my tank ever suffered from being too clean. JMTC

Guilty of this myself. Going to run a curve7 on my 90g.

 

[JayC]

You need to keep in mind one crucial point of each and every individual aspect pertaining your filtration system... YOU need to be in control of it. You need to have FULL CONTROL of it. Like a light switch. If your display ventures a problem, you need to eradicate the problem NOW. There is no such thing as overskimming. If the tank reads 0 nitrate, then shut the skimmer off for a day. Perfect time to clean it. There is no such thing as a flowrate 'rule of thumb'. Full control is having the ability to 'strip the water'. Another misconception pertaining filtration is plumbing all of your media reactors in series off of the same pump. Unless run off of a valve manifold where each can individually be fine tuned, the individual medias are not processing efficiently. They each require their own specific flow rates and pressures.

 

[Epicreefster]

So sizing depends on the skimmer brand, fish load, coral type and your degree of algae preference. I have kept sps in an algae forest almost fish less tank without a skimmer, and a spotless high fish tank with 2x rated skimmer. The higher you over rate your skimmer the more fish you can have and the less algae you will have in the display.

If you oversize your skimmer you can put all the fish you want in relatively early, and the skimmer/refugium/carbon dosing system will take the nutrients out. If you undersize or match size your skimmer you will have to stick with fewer fish for about two years until your corals grow large enough to adsorb the fish waste, corals are a fish waste export.

With sps especially they like high primary waste sources(fish poop) low final waste products( phosphate and nitrate). This is easier to achieve with a lot of fish and a big skimmer, heavy input and heavy output. While I'm not going to argue with the 30% dissolved organics removal of a skimmer I would argue that a bigger skimmer would export more fish waste solids before bacteria break it down to dissolved organics. These solids are what corals eat with their polyps, why they have polyps and not just a skin. So ideally you are balancing a lot of fresh fish waste with a system to export this before it breaks down to DOC's which build up to be toxic. Then a system like a refugium or carbon dosing to export these.

If I wanted an sps primary tank I would buy a high end, deltec or royal exclusive type, rated at 1.5x tank volume. Or a lower end brand at 2x tank volume and get a bunch of fish, but not too quickly. Then add a refugium from 5-20% the tank volume depending mostly on how many fish you want.

 

[Scott.h]

I'd rather have something a little too big, and too efficient, run it 12 hours a day if need be then have to buy something different. Buy once cry once.

 

[Shaun Sweeney]

Met a gentleman that owns a nice shop in CA. Seems like he's been in the business forever and he maintains a lot of upscale tanks. Anyway, he questioned my use of carbon when I told him I kept coral. He recommended keeping that kind of filtration to a minimum. I've done that for the past few years and haven't had any problems.

 

[Scott.h]

Further Studies on Protein Skimmer Performance by Ken S. Feldman, Kelly M. Maers
Elemental Analysis of Skimmate: What Does a Protein Skimmer Actually Remove from Aquarium Water? by Ken S. Feldman

humm so we need to run 3 skimmers apparently!

 

[Michael43]

Is a deltec really worth the money?

 

[twilliard]

A very reputable vendor on here told me to undersized my skimmer so the tank can have nutrients. I have always thought to oversize the skimmer especially with a lot of fish and sps. I ask because I'm ordering my new DT tomorrow which will be really just sps and fish. Volume with sump will be say 260-280 gallons after rock and minimum sand. I'm trying to choose my skimmer. I plan for a good amount of fish. Does the majority say to oversize it? My thought right now are for a aquamaxx Q5 rated for 300g with heavy bioload. I can save $200 doing the size below which is rated for 240g with heavy load. Love to hear how you guys skimmers are rated against your volume. Thanks for the help

I like to call this a good old myth, for instance my Helix 5000
Now this is on a total volume of about 110 gallons
They key to having a skimmer that is grossly over sized for a tank is the ability to "control" it.
These controls will allow the user to control and adjust any form of available nutrients to the tank.
Lets say you decide to start feeding heavier with a small skimmer. What happens from there?
Now to mention I do not change water in my system.

 

[Bob Escher]

Can you provide some more information on the subject in bold (or point me in the right direction)? Currently, my skimmer (Bubble Magus Curve 5) will be working well and then just all but stop pulling skimmate for an extended period (up to roughly half a day). I'm trying to isolate what may be causing this (the skimmer is finicky to tune but the current settings seem to perform best, that is, when it performs).

I have the same skimmer ( the curve 5) and it does the same. I raise it up on some egg crate and then it's better then over skims and I put it back down

 

[TaylorPilot]

My only issue with running a skimmer that is too big is sometimes they are inconsistent. They necks on the skimmers are sometimes pretty wide and you won't have enough organics to build up and flow over and into the cup. Remember, just because it is in the skimmer body doesn't mean it is out of your tank. Crud collected around the neck is still breaking down and being returned to the water table. Have a proper sized skimmer with a proper sized neck, allows it to remove the proteins effectively and consistently. I've never had good luck running over sized skimmers unless running the system very wet. But then you have to worry about increased top off water usage and gradual salinity dropping. If you do regular water changes, you can adjust for that easily.

 

[rob G]

I am in an interesting spot with this topic. I upgraded about 2 years ago to a 360 gallon plywood tank total volume of 310 gallons or so with sump and I still am running my SRO 3000 Reef Octopus from my 180. It skims really well I just have to clean it more often than I imagine I would a larger skimmer. I think most of it has to do with turnover rate, maybe I would be better off with a larger skimmer I just can't justify spending another $700 or $800 for a slight upgrade when I feel like I'm skimming my tank well enough right now. I have 17 fish most are small there's a tang, about 5 inches a 5 inch swallow tail angel, a 4 inch blue throat trigger and the rest are small.... Firefish six line wrasse some anthias Royal Gramma. I mainly have montipora, birds nest, Duncan Coral, a few other odds and ends but really hadnt had any problems. I guess every tank is different, I'm just not convinced my tank would benefit a great deal from the upgrade.

 

[Bruce Burnett]

I like to call this a good old myth, for instance my Helix 5000
Now this is on a total volume of about 110 gallons
They key to having a skimmer that is grossly over sized for a tank is the ability to "control" it.
These controls will allow the user to control and adjust any form of available nutrients to the tank.
Lets say you decide to start feeding heavier with a small skimmer. What happens from there?
Now to mention I do not change water in my system.[/

How is that Helix 5000 I had thought about it but I have a Reef Dynamics INS450 on a system of 300 gallons total. The Reef Dynamics will strip the water so I turn it off when feeding then back on. I feed heavy 4-5 times a day. I don't change water and only clean out detritus about every six months as I don't get a lot.

 

[Epicreefster]

Is a deltec really worth the money?

I would say so but then again I'm not usually building a tank on a shoe string budget. I think they are better than a reef octopus, but not twice as good at twice the price. Once you pass about 300 gallons you are severely limited on brands and I like deltec because they make skimmers rated to about 2500g, the 4585 I believe it is,and two of them can actually skim a 5000g sps tank with a few hundred fish in it.

I am in an interesting spot with this topic. I upgraded about 2 years ago to a 360 gallon plywood tank total volume of 310 gallons or so with sump and I still am running my SRO 3000 Reef Octopus from my 180. It skims really well I just have to clean it more often than I imagine I would a larger skimmer. I think most of it has to do with turnover rate, maybe I would be better off with a larger skimmer I just can't justify spending another $700 or $800 for a slight upgrade when I feel like I'm skimming my tank well enough right now. I have 17 fish most are small there's a tang, about 5 inches a 5 inch swallow tail angel, a 4 inch blue throat trigger and the rest are small.... Firefish six line wrasse some anthias Royal Gramma. I mainly have montipora, birds nest, Duncan Coral, a few other odds and ends but really hadnt had any problems. I guess every tank is different, I'm just not convinced my tank would benefit a great deal from the upgrade.

There is a big difference from a new setup that is rock a bunch of fish and a few small corals, a tank upgrade that usualy has at least a few large corals and a mature grown in tank. The new tank needs the most skimming because you need to feed enough to feed the corals, but as it breaks down the corals can only adsorb so much, so you get algae, or skimm heavy and get less algae. The mature tank can get by with much less skimming because the corals can adsorb so much. So if you upgrade slowly you match the nutrient input with output. Remember corals are plants and animals. They can use dissolved nutrients so if you have enough coral it replaces algae as a dissolved nutrient adsorber. But it seems to prefer low dissolved nutrients and feed on particulates instead(look at typical sps nutrient levels and systems like zeovit)

I think this is also why some very mature tanks crash, one coral dies and releases a lot of stored nutrients, killing another releasing more, and so on.

 

[zaher]

I'm having a vertex omega 150 on my 120 gallons total system it's working really well along with bio pellets and gfo / AC but I'm not really sure is I'm having a right size skimmer in my tank however vertex omega 150 is rated to 150 gallons heavily stocked !

 

[mcarroll]

Why wouldnt you account for sump volume?

Nothing living therefore nothing to skim coming from the sump for one thing.

For another, the volume of water in the typical sump isn't enough to matter all that much in terms of a skimmer rating.

Last, how could skimmer ratings be based on sump size when they have no idea what size sump anyone will fit with a given display tank? What if you run sumpless??

So, just count all the displays, frag tanks, refugiums, etc....still size the skimmer according to manufacturer guidelines though.

humm so we need to run 3 skimmers apparently!

Where did you see this?

Seems like the opposite:

Our data show that there are not compelling or remarkably large differences in measurable skimmer TOC removal metrics among the seven skimmers tested[...]

[...]protein skimmers appear to have a much larger variation in their prices than they do in their ability[...]