New Skimmers Worth It?

[Garage1217]

You wouldn't call the Vertex Alpha cone with an Askoll pump, a new skimmer design? That a cone which is all the rave, and it performed worse than an airstone driven skimmer.

Re-read my post:

there are not any newer designs tested other than the bk160 and a re170

Pretty wild how poorly the BK's performed.

Again, I would LOVE to see a controlled test of all current popular skimmer pumps with similar ratings flow wise on only 1 skimmer body as a control, with water levels adjusted exactly the same.

Then a test using the best of the pumps on different skimmer body types, neck sizes and chamber volumes / designs to see which actually works better vs what is hearsay on what works better.

Of course there would be a ton of details to be worked out to make the test fair, but nonetheless, A test I would like to see.

This tests did give a lot of great info, but not the exact way I would have run it if I was doing a comparison, and not any type of skimmer gospel. It does contain a LOT of good data though if you read through it all in detail.

To note, Does not surprise me at all on the airstone skimmer by the way, being that it would have extremely low turbulence the chamber.

Soooo much goes into designing a proper skimmer with pump matching, chamber size, bubble plates, height of the chamber, neck diameter and length. Just boggles the mind. And this does include matching a skimmer to your tank volume and load, ease of maintenance and more.

Just to put it out there, I have owned several skimmers as well, including an older ASM G1, msx200, a euroreef that I had for a very short time, several heavily modified super skimmers for nano tanks that went from a joke to actually working well, several small cheap skimmers that I modified and a custom unit I was toying with. While not a skimmer pro, I do understand the pros and cons of older vs newer designs and I have posted them. I do not have anything super expensive or crazy right now but do love my current skimmer which is an SRO5000INT for a 225 display, and about 20G worth of water in a 40B sump. And I would never go back if that says anything.

 

[tkeracer619]

Personally I think that study has some serious flaws and should be taken with a grain of salt. A small grain at that.

Your skimmer is working fine. A new skimmer like a sro will work better but is it necessary? Hardly.

 

[username in use]

What do you see as flaws?

 

[sirreal63]

OP...the color you are getting is consistent with the pellets, most of us that have run or still run pellets get the same after a while. I still own a G3, have tried numerous pumps on it over the years and the Sedra still performs the best. I even tried an Askol on it and it did not do any better than the Sedra. You should know that over time the Sedra will get weaker so replacing it with a new one will make a lot of difference.

In my old 125 with a very heavy bioload, I got crazy skimmate with the G3, thick, black and nasty. On the new 110 with almost no bioload the G3 did not perform well at all. I put in an Octo 110, which is a tiny skimmer compared to the G3 and it works better. Most people would say that the Octo is a better skimmer because it pulls more skim, however, that isn't the case, the Octo is better suited to the bioload. Even though it is one of the newer "more efficient" skimmers, it isn't better, it is just better suited to the bioload. There is no way it would have kept up with the old 125, where as the G3 did. Skimmer tech hasn't really changed that much since you got your G2, other than efficiency of the pump and matching pump to volume and air. If someone is coming from a crappy skimmer to one that is balanced for air, water and volume, then yes they will see an improvement, Garage is a perfect example of this. His previous skimmers were poorly designed, it is no surprise that his new Octo is kicking their butts. Your G2 is fairly balanced and that is what matters.

If I were you, I would keep the G2 but would either replace the pump or at least replace the impeller, they do lose some potency over the years.

 

[moondoggy4]

If you went with a bigger skimmer or more powerful pump you would probably get even worse skimmate your skimmer is working perfectly perfect balance between bio load and skimmer.

 

[tkeracer619]

What do you see as flaws?

Skimmers don't just work to full potential when put into a vat of water and ran for 24h.

Skimmers cannot just be set and expect that they will all be removing the same percentages of water, docs, whatever. Some are going to skim wetter, some are going to be more foamy, and some aren't even going to start working for a few days. Regardless if you use manufactures recommended setting. We all know this is part of dialing in a skimmer on a system.

How many times have you installed a skimmer. Turned it on. And that was it. It was set perfect. My guess is never.

The science behind it is interesting and it shows some valid points but as far as real world doc removal it just isn't applicable. Its a good study but most people who quote it are using the data in a way it was never intended.