berlin skimmer?

I found this on craiglist. saltwater lighting and protein skimmer The guy says he has 2 berlin skimmers, ones HOB the others regular in sump. One includes pump, the other doesnt. He says he only wants $40 for the two of them. Is this a deal?

he says on the skimmer it says it can handle 25-110gallon tanks. will this work with my 55 gallon with soft corals?

Where do I go for a replacement pump?

He used it on a 30 gallon tank.

 

Little difference between the insup ir HOB that will also do in the sump a Rio 2500 or a mag 7 is perfect and these are great skimmers ran them for yrs still have 3 of them ..One of the best skimmers ever sold I'll buy them if you don't

 

ok, I don't really understand how a skimmer works. Do I need a pump? can I just have the return line go to the skimmer... or no?

If so, I only have about 700 gph in my tank and the rio 2500 runs at 782gph, won't that be overworking? I don't want to run the pump dry.

I'd REALLY appreciate an answer to that one, I don't know if the gph on the skimmer has to match the flow of your tank or not. I would assume it does.

 

I have a Berlin Classic and like Tang stated, it works great!! Probably outskimms my 5 gal jug sized Octo Extreme I have....
I ran a Mag 9 on my Berlin and rocked... And yes thats a GREAT deal!!

You need a pump to not only send water into the skimmer but to draw the air in as well to create the air rich water mixture that makes skimmers work.

Some skimmers can be plumbed in using Ts off other return pumps or some work off of inline plumbing but this one does not.
I would recommend a Mag over the Rio as when I ran the Rio 1700 on mine it did diddly squat, but again like Tang stated you could go a step up or two in the case of the Rio

 

Thanks for the help fragenstein. But you didn't really help, can I run a pump that outruns my gph going through the tank?

 

yes you can