Guidence on big skimmers needed.

[khaosinc]

The new tank is still about 4 weeks out, primer is drying on the walls of my new fish room, and I'm still waiting on my order of base rock as well so I can't start landscaping yet either.

So my thoughts have turned to skimmers. Originally I was toying with trying and go skimmerless on a large system but I'm second guessing that thought.

My desires are an external skimmer, that doesn't take to much tweeking and ideally comes with everything (pumps etc) so I can have a design someone smarter than I am came up with. Space isn't much of an issue either.

The system will be a 750 gallon display tank, 300 gallon sump, and a 225 gallon (as soon as I fix my old tank) fuge/ macro algae tank. I may also incorporate a couple large tanks to make water changes as easy as flipping a switch. I'll leave all that for the build thread after the tank gets here though.

So, any good pointers on skimmers. Cost is a factor, but not the biggest one... I'd rather not have to buy another skimmer in 6 months because I hate it.

Another option I was toying with was getting two mid sized skimmers and have a little redundancy there as well...

 

[DaveMorris]

I just replaced two Euro Reef skimmers, a CS6-3 and a CS8-2 on my 300g tank with an MRC-3R and love it. Nice skimmer. Dual Beckett design and it generates some lovely green gunk. You would need something a bit larger for your system, though. Check them out:

www.myreefcreations.com

 

[Justdrew]

Take a look at the Hurricones. Early reviews and pictures have been impressive.

http://www.reefspecialty.com/Protein-Skimmers-Hurricone/c21_69/index.html

 

[Jeremy B.]

There is definitely no shortage of skimmers available on the market that would handle your size system. I would base the decision on a few different things....

- Space? You said it's not much of an issue, but some of the larger external skimmers can get really big!

- Bioload? You mentioned the size of the system, but what are the goals of the tank? A heavily dominated low nutrient sps system, or a moderately loaded soft / lps tank that could handle, and want a bit higher nutrient load.

- And the biggest thing of all, budget?

 

[khaosinc]

My goal is a mixed reef, Lots of palys, zoas and mushrooms, and several of the hardier LPS/sps corals. My plan is for lots of smaller fish, and hopefully a pair of sailfin tangs, and crosshatch triggers. I like alot of the basselets and wrasses, hence the plans for a huge fuge.

My budget is already out the window. I could go as high as 2K or so, but that can be a flexible depending on what I need vs what is available.