help with oceanic biocube skimmer

Yes, not much help on this forum. I posted a couple days ago about it because I just got one. I have found, now after the couple days, that bringing the bubbles just a tad up the collection cup tube is the best. Today (just now as I am typing) I looked and it seems to be performing nicely.

 

yah they work just not the best im still not sure were you want tje water level on it?

 

It is made to go in the right side chamber and be clipped on the wall separating that chamber for the middle one, that is what sets the water level. All it really does is produce the foam from the air stone (wood block) and get it to froth into the cup. Not fantastic, but I knew that going in. If you want more, you need a hang on and modify the back by cutting out a place for it to hang on.

 

i dont have a biocube so i was wandering how low yours sits in the water?

 

They are a terrible design, but they can be made to work. Like someone said the water level is set by clipping it onto the side of a Bio-Cube. This sets the water level so high that they can only wet skim. This is why everyone reports getting blu-ish green almost clear liquid out of them. The water level should actually be about 1/2" down the clear body. This gives the foam more contact time to concentrate the skimmate before spilling over into the collection cup. When I first got mine I tried messing with the air intake to get it running right, but found it's better to run a strait airline tube to the wood block and run it full open. This makes it foam up a lot better.

 

i see that sounds good i will try it k+

 

14 gallon Biocube that has been doing great thus far.

Bottom line question:

Am I better off with the skimmer and no filter cartridge, or with the filter cartridge and no skimmer. It is an either/or proposition with this tank. So far after a week, my water quality seems to be going down (ammonia, nitrate, nitrites all up noticably, but not yet horribly). All I've dumped from the skimmer cup thus far is essentially clear water. Help!

 

How much live rock do you have? It sounds like there was a substantial amount of bacteria in the carbon filter, by removing it you may have started a mini cycle. A small water change should help to keep those levels in check until your bacteria can catch up.

I would run the skimmer. The filter cartridge can remove chunks of stuff from the water, but it will also act as a nitrate factory if not well maintained. A tuned skimmer removes things that nothing else can. It will remove what the chunks of stuff breaks down into.

To get more dry skim out of your skimmer dial back the air input some. Less air being pumped in means the bubbles will have to linger in the reaction area longer before they overflow into the collection cup. This will force them to gather more organics and be much dryer. I would also replace the airline valve that came with the skimmer. The stock one is junk.

 

+1 i got a better valve and made the skimmer sit higher in the water now its working much better and if your dumping out water you deff need to turn down the airflow

 

Thanks for the response.

I have I would guess about 10 pounds of live rock and an inch or two bed of live sand. Never had nitrates and nitrites jump this high before when changing filter cartridges, which I do about once a month now. [Nitrite from 0 to .05, Nitrate from near zero to 5.0].

Did just kill some aptasia with that Aptasia-X stuff. Should have only made one change at a time.

I've dialed back the air, but my main concern is that even with this skimmer working as well as it can, will it really make up for the functionality that the filter cartridge was providing, or do I need to find a way to keep that mechanical/carbon filtration in the system as well.

The tank has been working great for the year or so it's been up, before the skimmer experiment.