DIY Skimmer Critique

[GuySmilie]

Sounds great. Can't wait to see what you guys come up with.
I've got a piece of 6" PVC that's been in the way for months now and I've been thinking heavily here lately on building an external skimmer. I like the simplicity of Randy's project and if you guys are tossing in ideas from Deltec, ER, etc, that's really got my attention. Been looking for some good ideas.

 

[rustybucket145]

Ok guys!! I plan on doing a total build on here but for now I only have a few minutes to post a few images so I figured I'd show some progress.

Skimmer buildin fuel!!

 

[rustybucket145]

Mine is the one on the floor I hooked it up last night. Was amazed by the amount of bubbles it produced. After a couple of hours it had begun to collect some green funk on top of the bubble column. I'm thinking I may have either my neck too long or my overflow too short.... hmmmm.....

Anyways, as some of you may have noticed,.... or not... the collection cup is a CD case that has the lid drilled out to slide over the neck. Cheap solution to a problem that we mulled over for quite some time!!

Anyways if you guys have any questions I'll be happy to answer but like I said above I plan on posting a detailed build when we get done with them.

 

[rustybucket145]

Ok, here is how we made the neck/cup totally removable as one piece. I would call this the 'head' of the skimmer body if I had to put a label on it, but I guess it's actually more of it's 'shoulders'.

This is how we went from the 6" PVC pipe down to the 3" clear acrylic of the neck.

The order goes like this: 6" PVC --> 6" Coupling --> 6" X 4" Reducing Bushing --> 4" X 3" Reducing Bushing --> 3" Cleanout (male slip to female thread) --> 3" Male thread to slip --> 3" PVC Sleeve (short piece of pipe) --> 3" OD Acrylic Pipe.

This is where the majority of the money was spent on the build. Each skimmer probably has about $30+/- in each 'head'...... or 'shoulder' if you will.

The main reason we chose these fittings is b/c they offered a nice slope down to the acrylic pipe. Even though we had to use several fittings we nixed the need for a 3" union which would have been $30 by itself. The two 3" threaded pieces is where the neck unscrews from the body. We lubed mine with silicone grease but teflon tape would have accomplished the same goal of good seal yet easy removability.

All of these fittings were purchased from a local Plumbing supply house or Lowes except the clear acrylic tube which came from TAP Plastics.

Here's the webpage I ordered the acrylic tube from: http://www.tapplastics.com/shop/product.php?pid=141



Ok so enough with the words, onto the pics.


Here are the 3" Cleanout (male slip to female thread) --> 3" Male thread to slip --> 3" PVC Sleeve (short piece of pipe) fittings. The 3" OD acrylic neck will slide nicely into the 3" PVC Sleeve.

Here are the three above assembled (not glued)

Here is a cutaway graphic of how the inside of the 6" 'shoulder' looks. See how the bushings allow the transformation from 6" to 3" go nice and smooth. These fittings are: 6" Coupling --> 6" X 4" Reducing Bushing --> 4" X 3" Reducing Bushing

This is the same fitting from underneath. Can't really tell the slope but it's there!!

Same fitting from above

Full Assembly!!

Body without 'shoulder'

Body with 'shoulder'!! That's one big honkin skimmer!!! :eek1:

 

[rustybucket145]

And Rusty said...... Let there be skim!!

24hrs+/- after test installation on my 90 gal tank (150 gal TWV).


Almost 20 hrs after installing the skimmer and it appears that it has 'kinda' broken in. It started skimming this afternoon around 6ish and proceeded to pull out over a gallon of green chunky funk over the next 3-4 hrs. I woke up this morning and my gallon jug had overflowed with the green stuff so overnight I estimate (judging by water loss) that the skimmer pulled out somewhere in the neighborhood of 2-3 gallons of skim. I do have it skimming kinda wet I think but my tanks been pretty much without a skimmer for a couple of months so I wanted to skim aggressively over the next week or two to catch back up.

Anyways, here are the pics!!

Here is the clear acrylic neck.... lots 'o bubbles!!!

This is the skim it pulled out within an hour of actually starting to produce skimmate. :eek1: It continued to fill this container and another just like it before I went to bed. Filled a gallon jug overnight and overflowed it.

 

[rustybucket145]

Here's Chris's (raycityboy1 on RC) Skimmer. It's the largest one of the build. I don't even know what to say about this.... :eek1:

 

[RandyStacyE]

Looks great! I hope you show some pics of the other completed skimmers

5 of ya building skimmers in one place ... I bet that was either fun or a fiasco over there.

I do like that you used a 3” neck. I’ll probably make another skimmer before winter with a 3” neck too (for my 75 gal).

Ahhhh I just noticed what you used for a cup! A CD/DVD container … nice

 

[ErikJL]

Has anyone tried to use a modified large funnel for a reducer? I have 8" PVC pipe I'd like to use for a skimmer and was considering this idea. Wal-Mart didn't have a funnel big enough, maybe Linens-n-Things does.

 

[Roland Jacques]

<a href=showthread.php?s=&postid=9278006#post9278006 target=_blank>Originally posted</a> by rustybucket145
that's freakin crazy!!! When did you mod yours?

Sorry i missed this. I did this mesh mod 5-9-06 Had to look at my gallery for the date. I think it was the first mesh mod on RC. It pulled 30 SCFH of air Not quiet as much as i wanted. That was before I new about Bubblemasters mesh Effamat. Your skimmer looks good.

 

[luke33]

So what scfh is this pump pulling modded?

 

[rustybucket145]

I don't have a gauge but it's alot!! Where would I get a measuring device from?

 

[rustybucket145]

Looks great! I hope you show some pics of the other completed skimmers

5 of ya building skimmers in one place ... I bet that was either fun or a fiasco over there.

I do like that you used a 3” neck. I’ll probably make another skimmer before winter with a 3” neck too (for my 75 gal).

Ahhhh I just noticed what you used for a cup! A CD/DVD container … nice

Thanks for the comments Randy!! And Thanks for all your guidance and webpage. I've referenced it at least a thousand times over the last few months. Yes, I will post pics of all the skimmers shortly. We just finished building the 4th one last night. It's definately the best looking one so far. So far mine's the only one hooked up. A couple of the guys are having trouble with the GenX 4100's leaking. I'm not sure of their progress but I know they were trying to contact both Gen X and the online retailer they bought them from.

My skimmer has been skimming like nobody's business. I raised the standpipe this weekend to skim wet and I took out 15gal's of nasty yellow tea green skimmate. I was due a water change anyways, just figured I'd let the skimmer do it for me . My tank's looking better, my fish are brighter and more active and my water has really gotten clearer, although I didn't realize that it wasn't clear to begin with it is REALLY clear now!! YAY!!

Building 5 of them together really ended up working out well. We saved a bunch of money on materials by doing it X 5 and everybody was there to help out when needed. Plus it was fun for all involved despite the fact that we picked the hottest week of the summer to do it in!! DOH!!

Ahhh... the CD case.... necessity is definately the mother of invention in this case. We all spent a bunch of time trying to figure out what we were going to use for cups. We looked at alot of ideas here on RC and on other DIY forums but couldn't really find anything that we liked. Some were too big, some were too small, some cost too much and some... well.... some where just plain ugly (no offense ). So a couple of weeks ago I'm sitting at my desk at work just racking my brain trying to think of something both cheap, easy and readily accessible to use and then..... there it was staring me right in the face.....

An Empty CD Spindle....

Turned upside down it makes the PERFECT skimmer cup. Locking lid, cheap, looks good, cheap, functions great, cheap.... oh, and did I mention cheap?

Also, the 3" neck is working out great. Very glad I took ya'lls advice and stepped it up from 2". Thanks Guys!!

I'll probably post some more pics tomorrow.

 

[rustybucket145]

Some more pics. Any questions? I'd be happy to answer.

We used silicone grease (available at local plumbing supply stores) to both lubricate and seal the threads on the detachable neck/cup. It is reef safe and potable.

This is hgreagan's skimmer (on RC). Can you believe he's putting this thing on a 55gal!!! :eek2::eek1:. He (and all of us) overbuilt our skimmers for future tank upgrades and the like....

 

[peterink]

With hgreagan next to the skimmer, now I have some comparision how huge your skimmer is...........for a 55G???

Excellent job guys. I will try building one for myself following your steps...thanks again.

 

[rustybucket145]

With hgreagan next to the skimmer, now I have some comparision how huge your skimmer is...........for a 55G???

Yup, 55gal!! We figured that we all wanted to go ahead and overbuild each skimmer by quite a bit..... just another reason to upgrade tanks in the future! The way we figured it would just be 1 less expense when upgrade time came, and a skimmer that big and of that quality can be one large expense! But now we're all poised to easily upgrade to much larger tanks now that we already have the skimmers.

 

[pogodzib]

Any updates as to how the skimmer(s) are running now after a couple weeks in use? Anything you would do different if doing it all over again? I'm upsizing tanks soon to a 210 gal tank (300+ gal total) and am wondering how this skimmer would work on a tank that size and how tall of a skimmer I should make if I use 6" PVC like you guys did.

 

[rustybucket145]

The skimmers are running GREAT so far!! I can't complain any what-so-ever. I have to clean the neck out every week b/c it gets so dirty. They are easy to adjust between wet/dry skim. The neck is very easy to remove and re-attach. Just be sure you use Silicone Grease to lubricate the threads so you can get them on/off easily.

Do different.... hemmmm... I'd pay a little more attention as to how much room I had under my stand. DOH!!! Other than that I can't really see anyway to improve on this design. Simply put.... it WORKS!! I've pulled more skimmate out of my tank over the last couple of weeks than I did in two years with my old skimmer (Berlin XL).

It does seem that everybody who went with the GenX 4100 pumps is having problems with them. The ALL leak!! in one way or another. One guy's vendor was good about it and has sent him another pump. I haven't heard if it's leaking or not but I'll find out. Another GenX user had to build a box with sound dapening material inside of it b/c the pump was so loud. I've been using a GenX 4000 (external pump) and aside from a little noise the pump is working great.

As for the size of the skimmer..... we built our skimmers with future use in mind. All of our skimmers would be rated at over 300gals so I don't think you would have any problems running this skimmer on a 300gal moderately stocked tank. If the tank was heavily stocked I'd suggest you upgrade to either two skimmers or an 8"-10" chamber and two or three pumps. I'd keep the same basic design principle as the ones we built, just beef it up some.

Good luck whatever you choose to do!!

 

[pescadero]

Rusty, I've got a question for your about your skimmer cup. As it turns out, I found this thread while looking for skimmer cup ideas, and I had also thought of the CD spindle case. (I had thought about a 100 CD case for bigger volume).

I've got a question for you about how you attached the CD case to the 3-inch clear acrylic tube. Did you just cut a pair of rings out of 3-inch PVC pipe, and sandwich the CD case cover between them? If that's what you did, what did you use for glue to bond the PVC and the clear acrylic to the CD case cover to get a watertight seal?

If you could post any extra photos of the cup section's construction, I'd appreciate it!

 

[rustybucket145]

pescadero--> You are exactly right. I used thin rings of 3" PVC cut using a miter saw so the cuts would be very straight. I glued the bottom ring on, let it dry then glued the top ring on sandwiching the CD spindle between them. I used an all purpose solvent glue called 'Amber' I found it in the same section of my local hardware store as the regular PVC glue. It bonded all materials very well.

You mention using a larger spindle.... I'd highly suggest drilling a hole in the spindle and threading a barbed fitting in for an overflow for the skimmate. I would have to empty my cup every day if I didn't have the external overflow. In the beginning (first month of using the skimmer) I would have had to empty it every hour.

You might also want to check out my other thread in the Coral Prop forum. I detail my new system build and how I worked the skimmer into it.

http://www.reefcentral.com/forums/showthread.php?s=&threadid=1224616

 

[pescadero]

thanks. that's a really cool setup you've put together in the other thread!

another skimmer question -- can you describe the plumbing connections? i'd just like to be sure i'm right about which pipes are which. thanks again!