sgould

A seemingly common question as many people begin looking at the equipment needed to set up a saltwater tank is "What does a protein skimmer do?", which is immediately followed by "Do I really need one?" (usually after having researched the price tag)

The (simplified) answer to the first question is: It continuously pulls THIS out of your fish's water.

The answer to the secand question is: Depends. Do you want THIS to stay in your fish's water?

I like visual aids.

Attached Images

SkimmerGunk.JPG (40.6 KB, 57 views)

atmmachine816

oo sweet nasty junk

agsansoo

Yum Yum ... Green tea anyone ?

agsansoo

What kind of skimmer do you have ?

sgould

Prizm pro deluxe. (I know...I actually haven't had any trouble with it though.)

agsansoo

Hey that looks pretty good ! I think any kind of skimmer you put on a tank is going to help, from a berlin air-lift to a euro-reef.

atmmachine816

My neighbor bought a prizm pro deluxe too for his 185gallon and he's been having good results from it. I did inform him about it's leaking history.

sgould

I've had no leaking issues either. A lot have also indicated the need for frequent adjustments. Once I learned to make small adjustments and give it time to "settle in", rather than trying to adjust it to perfection immediately, I was able to find a nice setting that I do not need to mess with much at all.

atmmachine816

hmm yes he mentioned he had to adjust it a bit before it worked nicely. Sounds like they aren't horrible skimmers just a bit more tweaking to do.

bhcaaron

EEEEEW! BUT! I do like pics, so, I guess I asked for that one, didn't I? lol

Visual aids do help. Thanks!

NirvanaandTool

Wow.... thats proof enough for me.
Time to start saving for a Remora i guess....

bdrou

Forum,

I know this is a little off topic, but will a protein skimmer help remove my brown algae?

Sincerely Bryce,

Cody

Could it do any help in freshwater tank

Peterpiper

No it wont remove the algae, but it removes proteins from the water, which may reduce the algae growth a little

sgould

No, protein skimmers do not work very well in fresh water.

bdrou

Peter Piper,



Thank you "Peter Piper".I thought it would remove nutrience and starve the algae\diatoms.


Thanks,Bryce

sgould

Ok...NOW I've had leaking issues with the skimmer. At 1:30 in the morning. Into the electrical outlet. Kinda glad I woke up when I did...could have been a very bad scene.

Peterpiper

Water and power point dont mix to well, you need a drip loop in your power cable.. do you have earth leakage protection? Glad nothing happened.

agsansoo

sgould,
Did you skimmer overflow ?

sgould

Got a drip loop. Had been doing some maintenance under the tank earlier and I hadn't noticed some of the cords got moved around and tangled.

I am not clear on whether it was an overflow or a bad seal. As I said, it was 1:30 in the morning and I didn't really dig very deep...just disconnected everything from the power strip, removed the skimmer, and went back to bed. I hope to have some time to play with it tomorrow and see if I can figure out what happened. Time is short these days...I'm in retail, and therefore working quite a lot over the next few weeks.

sgould

It looks like this was an overflow. I have hooked the skimmer back up and had it running for a couple of hours tonight and the seal appears to be fine. There is a space where the intake goes into the unit that is open and would be suseptible to overflow, and the water did appear to be concentrated in that area when the leak was occuring the other night. For the time being, I am going to continue to run the thing during the day when there is someone around "just in case", and turn it off at night. I may go ahead and upgrade to a new skimmer in the (very) near future.

agsansoo

Yeap ... My skimmer goes crazy at night, not sure why. It just does. Mine overflowed about three times when I decided to get a sump ! Now if it overflows it just does it in the sump, no more wet floors.

reef freak

Yum! Poo shake, my fave!! lol

I got a Coralife SS 125. 90ga, blue tang, Rabbitfish, and 4 other small fish that are 1 in+; add it up then add the skimmer.

Last night I cleaned mine and I swear that was the worst skimmate I've ever smelled and seen. I ran it on dry skimm so it was Black (Not green) and smelled lkike fish poo, dirty diaper and rotton eggs (That kind of Sulfur kind of smell)those evil little...

Oh, heres your Green Tea by the way

Peterpiper

A Protein Skimmer will not remove algae. However it will remove proteins from the water, and this will reduce the amount of food that is available, that the algae requires, so you will have a reduction in the algae growth. A skimmer is a good idea

Mike

sqould - great visual aid!

bryce - The skimmer will remove proteins from the water before they have a chance to accumulate in the tank and get broken down into elements that algaes use to grow. Will a skimmer ensure that you won't get nuisance algae? No. But they do help.