CADlights 39g Pro build thread

[timdanger]

with an unplugged skimmer, no GFCI trips last night! happy day. can we make it two nights in a row...?

re: rusted hinges, Eddie had said he hadn't heard of anyone else having this problem - i wonder if this is one of those 'unreported problems' that people just ignore or fix on their own, because there are a few people who have mentioned having the same issue over on nano-reef.com, too.

 

[reeftivo]

set back

set back

Ran into problem. Took the skimmer out, which has been working well for me, and decided to do my routine cleaning. While taking the pump off the bottom, the collar that is threaded into the pump decided to snap off-bummer! I threw in the euroreef skimmer but I really don't like that skimmer at all. I will contact eddie to see if he can send me a new collar or give me a deal on that new bubble mangus skimmer they have now for the pro. Anyways, if the euroreef does not kick in soon I'll pull my ATB and HOB till I can get things figured out.

Be carefull with that collar because I barely wiggled it and it came apart.

Tivo

 

[timdanger]

that sucks, dude.

i'm very very interested to see about these bubble-magus skimmers for the new pro x-1.

i am also curious about what Eddie is going to be sending me on Tuesday (what new pumps would they have been testing if they were planning on ditching their old skimmer?)

 

[reeftivo]

that sucks, dude.

i'm very very interested to see about these bubble-magus skimmers for the new pro x-1.

i am also curious about what Eddie is going to be sending me on Tuesday (what new pumps would they have been testing if they were planning on ditching their old skimmer?)

Hi Tim,

I've been checking sites all over about this skimmer and man-o-man it's getting some rave reviews. I just looked at their 150 skimmer which looks almost identical to the one cad is offering exept that the pump is inside the skimmer as opposed to underneath a stand. That sucker is only $130 bucks at nuocean-WoW!! Thats cheap. I like the cad version better than the one at nuocean because the pump is easier to access.

Tell Eddie to cut you a deal on the magus! He might! Heck with all you troubles he should let you have one to beta test.

Take care buddy!

Tivo

 

[reeftivo]

Just checked with Eddie and he said the new skimmer will be available for pre order this weekend and will be 100 bucks for all cad pro owners who purchased in 2009. Nice deal!

He said they will ship around the 25th of october.

Cad will be checking on how much air draw these skimmers will be pulling. If it's close to 300 lph (preferably 400lph) then this skimmer will be more than enough for a heavily stocked 39 pro. The high end skimmers like Bubble king, ATB, Warner, Deltec etc all are pulling around 400 for 100g + rated systems and from what I've read, these should kick booty. $100 for one of these is much better than $600-$800+ for the others.

 

[timdanger]

got off the phone with eddie, the new equipment won't be ready until end-of-november-ish (and i don't want to wait that long for a skimmer, i don't think). they are going to continue to sell the old skimmer, and just offer the bubble magus as an "upgrade" (although they are throwing in the bubble-magus upgrade for free apparently on new orders for a limited time?). he also said the 3 real changes were the skimmer upgrade option, the pump (much quieter, he says), and he modified the durso drain slightly (i'm not sure how).

he said current pro-system owners could upgrade to the new pump and/or bubble-magus skimmer for a wholesale price once the stuff comes out in November. sweet.

(reeftivo, were we on the phone at the same time or what?)

 

[timdanger]

wait, was it october or november that they are shipping?

 

[ItsMee]

I love the stock skimmer that came with the cadlight pro system. Not that I have that much experience with skimmers, but all I know is that I have to empty dark skim-mate every day, that it is easy to do so, and the skimmer is easy to clean.

he said current pro-system owners could upgrade to the new pump, bubble-magus skimmer for a good price once the stuff comes out in November!

I think it is awesome how cadlight offers its current customers upgrades as they improve. Will the upgrade be any less expensive than it is if you just bought the skimmer, or do you know? There is something about skimmers that excite me...I'm kinda weird that way.

I was thinking about optimizing skimmer performance. I used to have the drain so it goes into the same compartment that the skimmer is in until someone somewhere said Eddie suggests having it in the compartment that is in front of it instead. My reasoning for putting it on the other compartment, which was a mistake, is that more water that has not already been skimmed will be skimmed and it seems anything in the water column that needs to be skimmed would have a better chance of making it to the skimmer pump. Is the only reason it is suggested to be put in the other compartment is because the water level is changing, because bubbles from the drain will get into the skimmer pump, or another reason? I'm just curious Whatever the reason, do you think it is possible to remedy this so that the drain can be right next to the skimmer input?

 

[reeftivo]

wait, was it october or november that they are shipping?

Sorry! My bad! you're right -November!

I guess it's the NAC3 skimmer which is modified with the pump underneath.

 

[reeftivo]

I love the stock skimmer that came with the cadlight pro system. Not that I have that much experience with skimmers, but all I know is that I have to empty dark skim-mate every day, that it is easy to do so, and the skimmer is easy to clean.

I think it is awesome how cadlight offers its current customers upgrades as they improve. Will the upgrade be any less expensive than it is if you just bought the skimmer, or do you know? There is something about skimmers that excite me...I'm kinda weird that way.

I was thinking about optimizing skimmer performance. I used to have the drain so it goes into the same compartment that the skimmer is in until someone somewhere said Eddie suggests having it in the compartment that is in front of it instead. My reasoning for putting it on the other compartment, which was a mistake, is that more water that has not already been skimmed will be skimmed and it seems anything in the water column that needs to be skimmed would have a better chance of making it to the skimmer pump. Is the only reason it is suggested to be put in the other compartment is because the water level is changing, because bubbles from the drain will get into the skimmer pump, or another reason? I'm just curious Whatever the reason, do you think it is possible to remedy this so that the drain can be right next to the skimmer input?

The point of having the first chamber is to have an easily accessible area that can use mechanical filtration and act as a dampner for the microbubbles before they enter the bubble trap (the wier that goes up and over into the fuge). If you have alot of excess bubbles going directly into the skimmer chamber then your skimmer pump will pick them up and create more and may start to create cavitation/imbalance in the pump. The first chamber and the skimmer chamber are essentially connected and receive RAW water from the display at all times so that is what you want. The pumps receive a precise flow of water into the impellar chamber where the collar of the air intake then injects the air into the impellar chamber and shreds it into micros. If you have bubbles that are pulled into the opening before the injector/venturi then it can throw off the balance of the pump and create cavitation.

Hope that makes sense because a while back I tried to inject more air into a skimmer and detsroyed the pump in the process and someone with a wealth of knowledge told me what went wrong and why I could'nt do that.

 

[reeftivo]

Eddie has a promotional offer of the pro system. If you have purchased your pro system in 2009 or earlier, you can use the code BMPRO@COST to upgrade to the new Bubble Magus mini skimmer. If you use the code when ordering you will receive the skimmer at cost $100 + shipping. This is a great deal. I am looking forward to getting mine and seeing what it can do.

 

[CalmSeasQuest]

Did you get your Bubble Magus up yet Reeftivo? I think I'll wait to see your comments before upgrading.

I replaced the stock return pump with the Rio 20HF, the flow seems about right un-gated (had the wrong size ball valve.) It's louder that the stock pump but I'm hoping it will quiet down when it's broken in.

 

[ItsMee]

I too shall await your feedback on the skimmer upgrade! I won't be able to upgrade for awhile anyway as money is kinda tight right now - but i supp0se that works out because I should wait till you give the green light first anyway. Yah think there will be room for 2 skimmers? :dance:

 

[reeftivo]

Did you get your Bubble Magus up yet Reeftivo? I think I'll wait to see your comments before upgrading.

I replaced the stock return pump with the Rio 20HF, the flow seems about right un-gated (had the wrong size ball valve.) It's louder that the stock pump but I'm hoping it will quiet down when it's broken in.

No skimmer yet buddy! Hopefully friday. The first pics from RGillund looked very promising but I haven't seen any updates. I posted to see if he could give an update.

Glad to see the rio is working good. Sorry about the noise issue! You may want to take off the intake cover and pull out that bayle inside and see if it helps. I yanked mine out and it does still humm a bit but it's quieter. When the doors are closed I can't hear it. The noise from the light fixture fan will be high on my priority list soon-LOL . My lighting cycle is from 11:00am to 9:00pm so when I'm ready, I'll pull the stock fan in the morning and run it over to one of the local shops and see if I can find a lower decible replacement. That is the loudest thing on my tank. If I can't find a fan locally then I'll have to get the specs and try and find one online.

I assume your Rio is not touching the sides of the sump chamber-right?

Tivo

 

[reeftivo]

I too shall await your feedback on the skimmer upgrade! I won't be able to upgrade for awhile anyway as money is kinda tight right now - but i supp0se that works out because I should wait till you give the green light first anyway. Yah think there will be room for 2 skimmers? :dance:

Hi ItsMee!

I checked with RGillund who has the new skimmer and his earlier pics looked really good but I have yet to see any progress. Maybe it's breaking in slowly or there are problems but only time will tell. I'll post pics of the progress when I get mine and keep you guys informed in case you may want one down the road. Check with Eddie and see if the discount has an expiration. I think it's promotional so it may be. You guys are smart to wait and see how the beta test goes. The stock skimmer still kicks butt IMO.

There have been two times I could recall being really impressed by skimmers. The first time was when I got a great deal on the ATB multi and put it up against my ATI 160. The ATI was working awsome (so I thought) then the ATB started pulling skim that looked like used motor oil. The second was the stock cad skimmer because I had no expectations of it actually performing. It looked like it wouldn't work well because the neck of the skimmer was too small, the dwell time didn't look impressive at first, and the return fittings were nothing flashy but in my case I sure was wrong.

 

[ItsMee]

This reminds me of a question I had earlier. I was just looking at the pictures of the sump on the previous page that you posted Tivo and noticed the coffee colored skimmate-then our recent conversation about skimmate color dawned on me. You asked if my skimate was coffee or tea colored. I said it was coffee colored and you said good. Well, let me be a bit more specific. My skimmate is coffee colored when viewed under the cabinet and is a dark tea color when I empty it. I assumed this is not good, so I lowered the water level in my sump to about where you have yours (what is it, 7,7.5 inches?). The foam seems to have improved a little, hopefully the skimmate does as well - to the point of being coffee colored even when not sitting under my cabinet under low indirect lighting from the fuge light. I remember someone saying they raised their skimmer so I guess that is relative to lowering the waterline where the skimmer sets eh? Or would it be better to raise it IN ADDITION to the lower water level? If so, how did they go about doing that (I think it was you, Tivo?), or was that already covered and if so, about what page was it discussed? Scuse my horrible memory-I have a valid medical reason...and I was going to tell you what it is, but I forgot.

 

[reeftivo]

Your skimmate is fine! You don't have much of a bioload in there right now so actually your skimmate sounds like its very good right now. Skimmate will always depend on your bio load. Many people don't know this and they get frustrated and keep adjusting their skimmer and buy new ones thinking their old one sucks (done that!-LOL). Wet skim removes nutrients and water quickly (Trace elements/DOCs) and dry skimming is slower but pulls much more concentrated DOCs/protiens. The goal is dark but somewhere in between is good. Instead of raising or lowering the water level to adjust wet or dry, either raise the skimmer or adjust the effluent valve on th output to raise or lower the water level in the body. The bubbles should not flow up the neck quickly. They should build slow,thick and sticky (oops,sounds nasty!-LOL). Every time you tweek a skimmer it may take as long as a day to see the fruits of your adjustment. Most will adjust a skimmer and see it look promissing, then go back an hour or two later and see it's still doing the same thing. Then they think well I guess I need to adjust it again. What they should have done is wait because any time you adjust you are affecting the surface tension of the bubbles and they need to stabilize before the true results of the adjustment can be observed.

Do your bubbles in the neck rise slowly and are they fairly thick?

If so, you are fine. When you start adding more critters to the system the skim will darken. Remember, the skimmate will never be constant do to fluctuations in nutrient levels in the system. It will remove them when levels rise.

I run my skimmer spaced 1/4 inch off the bottom in 7 3/4 inches of water with the gate valve on the effluent slightly closed (slightly) and that works for me.


Hope that helps.

 

[reeftivo]

here is a huge pic (sorry-man I need to clean my sump area!:sad2. The skim in the cup is 4 hours old after a good cleaning. Chaeto algae is sick and pods everywhere. This little sump works great-I just need to keep it clean-sorry-LOL! Notice the rusty hinges-bummer!

 

[ItsMee]

Thanks again Tivo. Everything you said about the skimer makes sense. I didn't know it took that long to adjust to the tweaking - I thought it was more like 10 minutes. I really appreciate all your advice as it has saved me a lot of trouble. What did you use to raise your skimmer 1/4 of an inch? Is it still easy to take the collection cup off since being raised it is closer to the shelf that is above it? Or do you even use the shelf?

 

[reeftivo]

NP, The only reason I raised my skimmer a bit was because the drain (effluent) assembly with the valve was hitting the acrylic piece that separates the skimmer and drain chamber. I first put in 1/4 inch light diffuser panel under the skimmer and it work good at first until I noticed my nitrates would not come down below around 2 ppm and I always shoot for 0 (up to 10 is acceptable, just not for sps). I suspected it was the light diffuser that was trapping junk in the little squares so I took it out. In a day my nitrates were 0. I thought about what to use to raise it and was going to make notches in some pvc pipe but then I looked at some 1/4 in and 1/2 in vinyl tubing I had and figured that would work. I cut two 4 inch pieces of both and used heavy scissors to split it down the middle length wise and slid them on the bottom of the two black acrylic vertical stand legs. That gave me the 1/4 inch I was looking for and doesn't restrict the flow at all. I'll get a pic if you need one.

The extra 1/4 inch shouldn't cause problems with your shelf.

All good skimmers are adjustable at either the intake or the effluent. The water level in the sump shouldn't be manipulated to tune the skimmate, it should be adjusted so the skimmer pump is performing at an optimal pressure level. Most skimmers operate well in 6-8 inches of water, which with the skimmer pump off, is usually half way up the skimmer body. The 6-8 inches is the grey area that most of these mid size skimmer pumps operate best-not too much head pressure and not too little. the deeper the skimmer pump the more head pressure on it and the bubble production will lessen slightly. The higher the skimmer pump, the bubble production will increase but the dwell time will be reduced and the foam will spill out too quickly.

Hope that helps!