ChemE
New member
The best prices on thin-wall (1/8") cast arcylic tube that I have found are at US Plastic . At first glance, it isn't obvious which diameter gets you the most for your money; thus this analysis.
When dealing with skimmers the only thing that is important is the cross sectional area (CSA) of the interior of the tube. Thus, thick walled tube despite the fact that it is more expensive is actually detrimental; so we'll discard all the 1/4" wall tubing.
That leaves us with this:
And here is the graph of the data:
Thus we can see that the 12" tube is actually the best value. Even more interesting is that the 6" OD tube is almost a better value than the 7" OD tube. Well, it's not earth shattering, but it helped me decide on the 6" tube for my next skimmer. Perhaps you'll find it useful as well.
When dealing with skimmers the only thing that is important is the cross sectional area (CSA) of the interior of the tube. Thus, thick walled tube despite the fact that it is more expensive is actually detrimental; so we'll discard all the 1/4" wall tubing.
That leaves us with this:
And here is the graph of the data:
Thus we can see that the 12" tube is actually the best value. Even more interesting is that the 6" OD tube is almost a better value than the 7" OD tube. Well, it's not earth shattering, but it helped me decide on the 6" tube for my next skimmer. Perhaps you'll find it useful as well.
