Need opinions on an external skimmer

RO BH-1000. External pump so no added heat to your tank and easy cleaning. Also has surface skimming capibilities.

 

hes gonna need bigger than that....hes looking for 500 gallon and up.

 

hehe. I need something a lot bigger.. a whole lot. I'm looking at skimmers in the $1500 range that can run my future 500 gallon+ tank and will be able to handle the amount of feeding that my azoox build will put out...

So far It's between the
E.T.S.S. 1500 xr
E.T.S.S. Quad 1800 XR Protein Skimmer
Bubble King DeLuxe 200 external



Another thought I have is to forgo the skimmer completely and depend solely on algae scrubbers... The thought here is that since Algae scrubbers do not remove any food in it's use-able state that I could cut down feedings and be able to handle it all naturally... I'm going to attempt this first then decide on the investment in a skimmer.

 

Following...


I too am setting up an external skimmer, by no means the size and output you will need but external is external. I plan to install float switches & water sensors inside and outside my skimmer.

 

That's my thought too. Put the skimmer in a bucket with a wet floor sensor under it, and a float on the bucket. So there is dual redundancy to stop in case of emergency.. I will probably plumb the bucket with an overflow (uniseal) that is directed back into the sump for a 3rd fail safe / guarantee.

 

The bucket idea is not bad!

This may be dumb BUT.... If you are going to do a bucket cant you just bulkhead the bucket and use a In-Sump skimmer? Just fill the bucket with water using the external pump and pump the water back out.

Would that work?

 

^ You'd want to use a uniseal as opposed to a bulkhead on the curved sides of the bucket and let it gravity feed out.

You can't use two pumps in series like that with an intermediate container; there will always be a difference in flow rates you can't match.

 

He could use a float switch to control them but now we are depending a simple float switch and that spells failure .

 

ETSS are completely sealed except for the waste drain. Therefore there are no spills (not even by random chance) when used with the auto stop ping pong ball thing.

However with the Bubble King you will have to think of something like the bucket overflow

 

I would drop the BK200 from the list. It is flat out too small for the job at hand. The max I would put that skimmer on is a 180g. As I look online I see that it is rated for 185g to 400g depending on bioload. I would recomend that you consider a BK300 or an ATB 12" cone if you want to go needlewheel. If you have a place to put it though I would strongly consider the ETSS.