here is a well documented article about the truth behind skimming and how effective it is...30% IS ALL YOU GET!!!!!
enjoy....
Purifying aquarium water with a protein skimmer represents one of the major strategies for maintaining water quality. This singular piece of equipment can often constitute the major set-up capital expense after the tank itself. With its presumably pivotal role in aquarium husbandry and its high price tag, it is no surprise that skimmer manufacturers strive to outdo one another with their exhortations and grandiose claims. For example, what aquarist can resist statements like:
Precision Marine:
"These skimmers will outperform anything in their class."
"Our fractionators strip organics from the system quickly due to the high flow rates they are designed to operate."
AETech (ETSS):
"This provides certain unique operational properties set it apart from the rest of the ETSS line. Giving your tank gentle but highly effective waste removal that will never over skim your aquarium. It creates the finest bubble size that totally fills the skimmer body with so much air that it turns the water to a solid milk color. The countercurrent action allows for far greater air water contact time and reduces the amount of wet foaming to a minimum."
Euroreef:
"Custom modified pumps, "Euro-AirTM" venturis, and "Euro-WheelTM" pinwheel style impellers are combined to create that incredible volume of micro bubbles that provide the immense surface area resulting in unrivaled quick removal or organics resulting in a healthy aquarium."
"The efficiency achieved with this design translates into higher performance at a lower operating cost to you!"
These statements, which are representative and certainly not unique amongst skimmer manufacturers, raise a series of questions:
* What is the factual basis for these claims?
* How do the skimmer manufacturers assay skimmer "performance"?
* Are there any metrics at all available to quantify skimmer performance?
* What does the concept of performance even mean when discussing skimmers?
In the article to follow, we present a new approach to addressing these questions. We will introduce concrete definitions for skimmer performance that focus on both the rate of organic contaminant removal and the extent of organic contaminant removal from saltwater. We then will introduce an experimental procedure, based on a model system, to measure these performance metrics for four representative skimmers. Finally, we will show how this model system accurately replicates skimmer performance with authentic aquarium water. We hope that these advances will prove valuable in the hands of forward thinking skimmer designers by providing the means to optimize skimmer performance as a function of both design variables and operational variables. Thus, it actually might be possible to provide, for the first time, unequivocal evidence in support of the claims of "best" so indiscriminately dispensed today.
full article can found here lot's of reading.....thats just the intro...
Advanced Aquarist's Online Magazine - Feature Article: The Development of a Method for the Quantitative Evaluation of Protein Skimmer Performance
