Mrc???

[DrBDC]

I've only had a G-2 to mess with for 1 day once and I thought the quality of the plastic and the overall operation was a big piece of junk. Seemed like you could blow better bubbles with a straw. A plain old homemade pvc pipe with a good air pump would blow one of those away and be much stronger. Look for a good quality skimmer made with good quality acrylic and either needlewheel or downdraft/beckett style. JMO

 

[sirreal63]

A G2 is underpowered, the G3 is about the right size. The quality of the plastic has nothing to do with the performance, it is the size and the ability to produce foam....some people used to use 6' tall home made skimmers and they worked great but looked horrid. hehehe

This is daily production from my G3 recirculating.

This is since 5 this morning...they do work and work fine.

 

[Mr.Firemouth]

I use a MRC-6 on my 180g/90g sump.

This skimmer is cycling a new system with 150LBS. of uncured live rock and pulled 7 gallons of mud in the last 5 days!!!
If you get a bigger skimmer you will be unlimited in choices later.
If you find you are overskimming you can put the skimmer on a schedule and use it part time.

 

[Reggae Fish]

So, I don't understand. When chad says tinkering with it, how much additional maintenance does it require???

 

[DrBDC]

My downdraft requires nothing but cleaning the cup. Maybe a beckett has a different issue in the injector design.

What I was going on about with the acrylic/plastic thing is that if I were to use one of the cheaper plastics you could bet money that I'd break it. Performance wise it really doesn't matter but an ASM or similar material skimmer wouldn't last me 6 months. Within a week I'd drop the cup and have a plastic scar from the repair. Within a month I'd bust off one of the flanges. If they made them out of stainless or titanium I'd opt for that even! :lol:

 

[Reggae Fish]

Can someone chime in to what the injector even does???

Plus, I don't mind cleaning anything as long as I know it needs to be done at a certain time each month, etc...

However, I just want to be able to set the skimmer to where I need it, skim, empty, clean, repeat...Why wouldn't this work???

 

[Reggae Fish]

Doc- What are you running now? You got rid of that 48 foot one, right???

 

[Chelsey]

<a href=showthread.php?s=&postid=8660827#post8660827 target=_blank>Originally posted</a> by Reggae Fish
Can someone chime in to what the injector even does???

Plus, I don't mind cleaning anything as long as I know it needs to be done at a certain time each month, etc...

However, I just want to be able to set the skimmer to where I need it, skim, empty, clean, repeat...Why wouldn't this work???

the injector mixes air with the water

 

[Reggae Fish]

So, why does the beckett style require more tinkering?

 

[DrBDC]

Here some info on the skimming:

skimming basics:

http://reefkeeping.com/issues/2006-08/rhf/index.php

Some explaination of different kinds:

http://reefkeeping.com/issues/2002-06/fm/feature/index.php

 

[Reggae Fish]

Thanks roy...The 2nd is a great breakdown...However, I now don't know what I would like.

When it says "beckett head requires cleaning" what area is that speaking of?

 

[DrBDC]

It would be a part at the top of the riser tubes where the water/air mix is injected in before it goes down into the main reactor body. Sometimes people take the downdraft injectors off and replace them with beckett injectors and remove the bioballs that the downdraft style uses to break up and mix the water/air. So my guess would be that the beckett injector head itself does a better job of mixing the air/water so you don't need the balls in the tube. At the expense of that they require a little higher pressure although the downdrafts need a pretty high pressure pump as well. Awhile back some were changing thier etss skimmers over to beckett and as far as I know, everyone went back to the downdraft style as the mod didn't work right. My theory on that is they should have upped their pump a little higher but I'm not sure.

 

[DrBDC]

Here's a pic of a diy style beckett head that would sit at the top of the intake tubes:

And here is a fancier nicer looking one: