Does anyone with at 200+ gallon system run a PM Bullet skimmer?

[ReefDoberman]

Just like the title says....I tried to do some research on user experice with the bullet 3 or larger and I could not find much however what I did find sounded great. My main concern is that they rate this thing pretty high for only having one beckett and needing just a mag 24 to drive it...

 

[Fiziksgeek]

I ran a PM bullet 1 on a smaller tank, and then a big dual beckett from MRC on a larger tank. I would recommend a good pressure rated pump for any beckett skimmer. I would use the pan world 150ps or similar on the Bullet 3!

 

[ReefDoberman]

Yea it looks like the best pump they rate for the bullet 3 is a Pan World 200ps... I am going to keep my eye out for one but I already own a mag 24 so I thought I would just test it out with that first.

With such high ratings on these skimmers and the cost (low compared to many) I thought I would have found a number of build threads in this forum running PM Bullet 3 or XL...

 

[Fiziksgeek]

Well, the upfront cost of beckett style skimmers is lower, but over time, the operating costs can far outweigh the upfront cost. I used a pan world 200ps on my dual beckett from MRC, and it was an excellent skimmer, pulled out lots of nasty gunk! BUT...it draws close to 300 watts! With rising electricity costs, especially here in the northeast, or even worse out in CA, it works out to be a much better deal to put the extra money into a high end needlewheel skimmer. Personally, I am saving about $350 per year with my Deltec 851 vs. the MRC skimmer.

There is also a noise factor, and potentially a microbubble factor is your system isn't set up well to handle a influx of bubbly water from a beckett.