The Life Reef Skimmer Club

[bawalitt]

and the obvious is your feed pump for your skimmer sitting in a constant depth of water?

I clean the skimmers neck every 10-15 days.
The pump and the drain are in a constant water level section of the sump.
I have spoken to Jeff and he said that it could be something in the pump, but the pump Is only 3 months old, and has been recently cleaned.

 

[d2mini]

I would look at the pump first.
Get your hands on another one. Worst case, you end up with a backup pump.
If you swap pumps and still have the same problem, at least you eliminated the pump as a cause.

 

[bawalitt]

I would look at the pump first.
Get your hands on another one. Worst case, you end up with a backup pump.
If you swap pumps and still have the same problem, at least you eliminated the pump as a cause.

I had replaced the pump with Vertex V6 pump which is rated for approx 1800 gallons per hour and had the same problem.
I think it's something to do with the drain or back pressure

 

[rEeFnWrX]

Have you taken apart the venturi to rule that out?

 

[jcolley]

Hello gents and ladies,

I have a problem with my Vs3-36 powered by a mag 12 with a Mazzi.
The water level inside the skimmer tends to shift slightly, but its enough to either make it start skimming very wet (that collection cup fills in 7-8 hours)
OR
it starts skimming very dry and the collection cup will collect less than 1" in 2 days.

I clean my Mag 12 every 12 months and its working perfectly fine. Last cleaning was approx 1 month ago.

Here are the attached pics. Any help or suggestions would be appreciated.

Silly question, but is your skimmer drain pipe submerged after the gate valve? I had a simliar problem using an external skimmer. I never saw it until I replaced the feed pump with a different one. Once this problem started, I noticed the same thing you are talking about, random variations in height from one extreme to the other with not much in between.

Finally solved it when I realized with the valve shut far enough, the skimmer was purging all the air from the drain line and it was going full siphon vs open channel flow. I raised skimmer drain to just 1" above the sump water surface to prevent the siphon from forming and haven't had a problem for 2 years since.

 

[bawalitt]

Silly question, but is your skimmer drain pipe submerged after the gate valve? I had a simliar problem using an external skimmer. I never saw it until I replaced the feed pump with a different one. Once this problem started, I noticed the same thing you are talking about, random variations in height from one extreme to the other with not much in between.

Finally solved it when I realized with the valve shut far enough, the skimmer was purging all the air from the drain line and it was going full siphon vs open channel flow. I raised skimmer drain to just 1" above the sump water surface to prevent the siphon from forming and haven't had a problem for 2 years since.

Thanks for the reply
I have a stand pipe right after the gate valve to prevent a complete siphon.
and i do get a lot of large bubbles from the drain, so i dont think that its a siphon issue

 

[coffeetwitch]

there are few things that could cause what you have going on. pump venturi and the gate valve on your return from the skimmer. ( again i mention the foam getting sucked into the venturi air supply because i have seen that with my "short" collection cup.)

your pump is 3 months old.... new does not always mean its good. just look at how electronics fail on cars like freshly replaced alternators or starters.

your venturi could have something blocking the air supply. salt creep or something that was skimmed out of your water.

your gate valve or return piping, although unlikely, could have something that intermittently blocking the flow.

if all those are good its something that is getting introduced to your water and is acting like how chemiclean acts on a skimmer. so maybe an additive your using???


then again idk

 

[Brother D]

I did talk with Jeff, and he said the blue line 40 that he recommends is the "minimum pump" to achieve cost savings. I upgraded it to the blue line 100 when I ordered...

I have the 72 as well but I'm only running the 40. I have a spare 70 that I've been thinking of using instead and when I read that you ordered the 100...I have to see that in action. I'm imagining the water jet coming out of the venturi actually blasting a hole through the plastic end cap :lolspin:

 

[hobbzz]

Johnny are you using your 36 on your 180? Is it constantly pulling or does it ever catch up and sit idle? It makes me pretty leary that it's "rated" for up to 600 gallons but works perfectly fine on a 180 if that's the case. Makes me wonder whether it would be able to handle my 300 or if I should be looking into the 48...

 

[NewMariner]

I have the 72 as well but I'm only running the 40. I have a spare 70 that I've been thinking of using instead and when I read that you ordered the 100...I have to see that in action. I'm imagining the water jet coming out of the venturi actually blasting a hole through the plastic end cap :lolspin:

I tend to overstock a bit. The entire system will be around 1500 gallons. I will have a 478g Reef, a 140g Fish Only, and a 110 I haven't figured out what to put in it... I tend to overfeed, so the fish usually get fat, and dirty up the water. There wasn't much of a price difference in the 40 and the 100 so I figured pumping more water into it would make it perform better, after my talk with Jeff..So I thought why not...

 

[azjohnny]

Johnny are you using your 36 on your 180? Is it constantly pulling or does it ever catch up and sit idle? It makes me pretty leary that it's "rated" for up to 600 gallons but works perfectly fine on a 180 if that's the case. Makes me wonder whether it would be able to handle my 300 or if I should be looking into the 48...

I am running the 36 on my 180 and it depends on how I run the skim mate, When I run wet the cup fills up within a couple of days. I prefer to run it dry and than it will need to empty the cup about every 4 days. I think the larger skimmer is good with mine due to the small neck size. I think its a good thing when the skimmer catches up, after all the job of the skimmer is to remove crap from the water

IMO the 36 will do well on your 300.

FYI bayoupr is selling the 8" diameter skimmer he had made recently complete with a Blueline 100PX pump. I would buy it if I didn't have mine

http://reefcentral.com/forums/showthread.php?t=2448505

 

[Brother D]

I tend to overstock a bit. The entire system will be around 1500 gallons. I will have a 478g Reef, a 140g Fish Only, and a 110 I haven't figured out what to put in it... I tend to overfeed, so the fish usually get fat, and dirty up the water. There wasn't much of a price difference in the 40 and the 100 so I figured pumping more water into it would make it perform better, after my talk with Jeff..So I thought why not...

I like. You could conceivably run 2 venturis pointed at each other at the base of the tower, split the 100 outlet between the 2 or run 2 100's...supercharged!

 

[hobbzz]

Yeah I saw that but it looks like a custom job. I'd prefer something that has a track record.

That's my point about the skimmer catching up. If it runs constantly on your 180 and never catches up that doesn't bode well for putting it on a larger tank. I've got 30 fish and I'm still not done adding.

Jeff talked about the 36 and larger possibly sitting idle, but he wasn't sure. Then I read in this thread that people are putting them on much smaller tanks with no idle time. If a skimmer never sits idle, it's on the smaller side for the tank it's on.

Anyone who owns the 48 think it would have a hard time producing on a 300 with 30+ fish? Too big?

 

[ken6217]

I like. You could conceivably run 2 venturis pointed at each other at the base of the tower, split the 100 outlet between the 2 or run 2 100's...supercharged!

Like mine? Not a LR though. No way I'd run a 6" diameter body skimmer with a neck with an ID of 2 1/4" neck on a 1500 gallon tank.

 

[bayoupr]

Yeah I saw that but it looks like a custom job. I'd prefer something that has a track record.

It is a custom job. The only reason I am selling it is because I bought it and then downsized to a 120g. Way less load than I had on the 180g.

 

[ken6217]

Not really a custom job at all, but they can make it to your specs. I had them play around with the neck length for me though.

 

[bayoupr]

I had them play around with the neck length for me though.

I had Jeff make me a taller neck for the 36" one time and it work real good. I didn't change the dia. only the height.

 

[ken6217]

I know. I was saying that on my skimmer I had the neck length changed.

 

[hobbzz]

The rating of "up to 250 gallons" is inflated. I wouldn't even use the 30" on a 250.

Which model do you think would be good for a heavily stocked 300g?

I'm also finding that his ratings seem to be inflated due to the tanks people are running them on with no problems, that are much smaller than the ratings he gives. And he rates the 6" diameter 36" at up to 600 gallons and the 8" diameter 48" up to only 500...

 

[SausageArm]

With a 550gal tank you should have more than enough space to run the skimmer externally. Then you could have Jeff make you a custom skimmer like someone else was just posting with a much wider skimmer body.

Why did you suggest a custom skimmer over the standard VS3-60 (60" tall) which is rated at 700gal?