AquaC CLUB!

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have the og unit -ev90.. started using it again this year.. its very inconsistent if the water level isnt steady and feeding. gallery has a pic of it in its 1st week when it skimmed lighter brown stuff. but now its skimming dark dark crud.. really just need to find the sweetspot on the valve.
 
Just a question here, no argument intended.

For those that are pulling out weak tea colored skimate or clearer, could it be there isn't a lot of organic waste in your tanks?

Seems like this might be an obvious but overlooked culprit perhaps?
 
wds21921 said:
Just a question here, no argument intended.

For those that are pulling out weak tea colored skimmate or clearer, could it be there isn't a lot of organic waste in your tanks?

Seems like this might be an obvious but overlooked culprit perhaps?
Click to expand...


I had the EV120 but could never get it to skim worth a darn. I now have an ER CS8-2 which skims great and doesn't require tuning once set up. I have a heavy bio-load but I feed frozen krill and mysis every day which has binders in it (so I've been told)which are hard on skimmers as far as getting consistent skimmate. Even my ER shuts down for an hour or so after feeding frozen food.

Although I sent my Aqua C back after over a month of trying I still feel they are an above average skimmer and much better than most if you can find that sweet spot and maintain it. I just never could. The workmanship on these skimmers is outstanding and the customer service is second to none. When I couldn't get mine to work the president/owner of the company called me several times and right from the start told me he would give a full refund if that was what I wanted.

To get back to the above quote a properly adjusted skimmer will still pull an amazing amount of skimmate out of a tank with a light bio-load as long as it's an established tank. I know this because I've seen it plus I did a huge amount of research for the two months I was having skimmer trouble.

Dave
 
Hmm thinking more and more about it then, it sounds like we're still possibly missing a piece of the puzzle to effectively reduce organic waste.
That is, if we assume that you can always pull out a heavy load of skimmate regardless of the input of organics.
Interesting.
 
I've got an Aqua-C EV-180 and when I installed 1 size bigger pump than recommended (went to a mag 9 from a mag 7) it skimms like crazy. I use the air valve to set the skimmate, dry or wet, and am very happy with it. Beware, the skimmer can overflow and make a mess if set too wet!
 
I also went up one size of pump on my EV-120 from a Mag 5 to a Mag 7 after waiting for 3 weeks for the skimmer to start producing foam. It started working almost immediately and after a week I had more foam than I knew what to do with. I made some adjustments with a ball valve on the output of the pump and with the air injector and starting getting consistent dry foam, but I did have to throttle back the pump quite a bit.

I started thinking that since I had to throttle back the pump so much that maybe the skimmer is now broken in and the Mag 5 would now work. I put the Mag 5 back on the skimmer without the ball valve, opened up the air valve all the way as well as opened the gate valve on the skimmer all the way and I am now getting good dry foam and the skimmer is producing dark skimate every day!

I guess patience is needed for these skimmers. I did the usual vinegar/hot water bath before putting the skimmer in the sump. But it still took my EV-120 around 5 or 6 weeks to get totally broken-in.

I have posted a pic in my gallery of what the skimmer now looks like around a week after putting the Mag 5 back on the unit.
 
Got my Aqua C Remora Pro with Mag 3 upgrade this past week and I'm loving it.
Thick rich filthy scum and way smelly too.
Hmm, if I put a suit & tie on it I could market it as a politician.
 
Hey Now all,

New member here! Just fired up the EV 180 on my 40 barebottom breeder. This skimmer is so DARN easy to setup a monkey could do it and yet its just as powerful as any other skimmer on the market while using alot less energy.
The skimmer is built amazingly well. The design is flawless in my opinion. And a big cheers to Jason and Christine...what a team! Man it feels good buying a product from an honest company.



take care,
Jared
 
Welcome to the AquaC club, jaredt.

I couldn't be happier with the new EV400. The GenX Mak4 is plenty powerful enough. I had to choke the air intake some, and I'm also using the gate valve so that the water line is about 1\4 inch under the top of the box. This way there arn't any large air bubbles rising and creating turbulence in the riser.
 
jaredt said:
Hey Now all,

New member here! Just fired up the EV 180 on my 40 barebottom breeder. This skimmer is so DARN easy to setup a monkey could do it and yet its just as powerful as any other skimmer on the market while using alot less energy.
Click to expand...

Actually that is not true. I have an EV400 and it is a good skimmer, but it does not use alot less energy than other skimmers, especially needlewheel skimmers, like Euroreef, ASM, and Deltec. My EV400 uses a Mag2400 which uses about 265W of power. I divert the flow so I would guess about 180W of it goes into the skimmer. Spray injection skimming is more of a "brute force" method, albeit an effective one. Compare the power consumption to a comparable needlewheel skimmer though - a Deltec, for example, can skim a much larger tank using the same amount of power - of course, it is much more expensive.
 
Hey Now Captain Coral,

Thanks for the warm welcome! Yeah the 180 has been setup for 12 hours and it has already foamed up with some wet skim. Still getting broken in. My Sen 700 with the gate valve completely open keeps the water line about a 1/4 inch above the base of the riser tube. When I turn the air valve open all the way the bubbles move up about half way up the riser. I did notice turbulence at first, but that has subsided some. This skimmer rocks!


joelsaxton-

----------------------------------------------------
Brand / capacity / Power needed / Pump used
----------------------------------------------------------
EV 180 / 280gallons / 70 watts total power/ Sen700

Euroreef C12s/ 300 gallons/ 100 watts total power/ 2 sedra 5000

Deltec 700/ 300 gallons / 50 watts total power / Eheim

MR2 Beckett/ 300 gallons/ 170watts total power / Gen-x pcx55

When I posted I was thinking about the becketts which I tried before the EV series. In my opinion the EV is just as powerful as a Beckett but if you see above the EV uses 100 watts less to achieve the same performance. Even though its close the EV still beats out the most popular needlewheel skimmer on the market (Euroreef). Deltec...well thats another story....a story I am glad my wallet is not a part of.:D

take care,
Jared
 
Cool.

Just make sure you take their capacity ratings with a grain of salt. Every company has uniquely nebulous ways of determining capacity.
 
true-

it is subjective...therefore it makes it kind of hard to really judge which skimmer brand utilizes energy most efficiently.

take care,
Jared
 
I use an EV400 on my 240g. The EV400 is rated for up to 450g - this is Aqua C's recommended maximum size, so again, grain of salt.

I chose the EV400 for a few reasons:

1) Half the price of a similar Deltec skimmer (if I had $ I'd go Deltec, though)

2) Compact design, fits in small sump.

3) Ozone-ready (I use ozone)
 
jaredt said:
true-

it is subjective...therefore it makes it kind of hard to really judge which skimmer brand utilizes energy most efficiently.

take care,
Jared
Click to expand...

Actually it is generally asccepted that needlewheel is more *efficient* than spray injection - but there are many other considerations besides wattage - which is why I went with the Aqua C.

Also, I wouldn't use an EV180 for such a big (280g) tank unless it was really lightly stocked. You'd want an EV240 at least. How many fish do you plan on keeping?
 
hey now Joel,

Yeah I like to overskim :D

And your right! There are so many reasons why the EVs are a fantastic skimmer choice other than energy savings.
I would like to give the euroreefs a test drive however. I am thinking about trying the new cs80 which is the brand new line replacing the es5-20. I like to try as many different skimmers as I can. This EV 180 though sure seems tough to beat.

take care,
Jared
 
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