Red reef Prizm Skimmer

[ericbye]

So i just got a tank the other day and it came with a red reef prizm protein skimmer, to see if it works i hooked it up to my 30 gallon fw, its pumping water but so far i havent seen the bubbles reach the hight of the cup, can this take quite a while?

 

[Hop]

That's becuase it won't work with FW. You need the SG of salt water

 

[ericbye]

oh really? ive heard of a lot ofppl using skimmers in fresh water, maybe its just the skimmer, thanks.

 

[hairymushroom]

May i ask what size tank you intend to use this on? do you mean red sea ? skimmers only work on salt water

 

[ericbye]

yea i meant red sea, it came with a 45-50 gallon long tank. I know its rated 90-100 gallons, but also heard thats a lot over rated. im on a pretty tight budget right now tho.

 

[Hop]

Nope, you need the salinity in order to make them work. Putting one on a fresh water tank would not do much more than aerate the water... Kinda like that w/ all skimmers

Feel free to run a search on that topic and you will see what I mean. Probably even some pictures

Also beware of the prisms, they have been known to dump water all over your floor!

 

[hairymushroom]

You do get a type of skimmer designed for koi ponds , i run a prizm on my tank , it takes a lot of tuning but once you get it right it can pull out some really nasty skimmate.

 

[Hop]

A skimmer for a Koi pond is different. it is not a protein skimmer, nor does it work the same. It is a device that pulls the pump or filter's water intake from the top or surface of the pond, usually through a floating device. There is no water/air mixture, no column and skimmate. Works the same as surface skimmers in pools. Basically to get debris off the water's surface.

That's all I could find after searching for a half hour... If there is a true fresh water skimmer, let me know, I would love to read up on it!

Thanks!:rollface:

 

[ericbye]

how would i tune the skimmer?

 

[hairymushroom]

hey Hop , check out www.ultrazap.co.za/html/foam.htm sorry i dont know how to post a link, i know of a few people using this in reef tanks with great results

 

[hairymushroom]

hey it worked , ericbye, to tune it adjust the black knob so the bubbles go about half way of the skimmers neck

 

[Hop]

Thank you! I read a while back that protein skimmers were initially made for water treatment plants. But for the life of me, I couldn't find anything on FW use. I thought if I went back to the beginning, I could find out how to make my skimmers better. An outside the box project if you will

But I still wonder how they get the fine bubbles in FW. Must be the venturi or a RC design. This could take months I wonder if this is how deltec and ER started out:lol:

 

[hairymushroom]

yes, it based on a venturi for the small bubbles