Best Skimmer at any Price

Discussion in 'Protein Skimmers' started by Servillius, Dec 8, 2012.

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  1. Servillius

    Servillius Montipora Digitata

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    I have a 60g reef and will probably upgrade to a 120g soon. I quite like my reef octopus, but I'm curious. What is the genuinely most effective skimmer for that size range at any price. The goal isn't to spend the most money. I just want to know what really does the most work pulling out the most, nastiest skimate most reliably?
     
    Last edited: Dec 19, 2012
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  3. Daniel072

    Daniel072 Giant Squid

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    oh gosh there are lots of great ones out there. I have a 6 year old octopus running on mine. It's going great!
     
  4. m2434

    m2434 Giant Squid

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    Usually I think skimmers are a cost effective, compared to other methods, but not really efficient compared to say GAC. GAC is exhausted quickly though, so, would get expensive to replace a skimmer with GAC, if you didn't have a skimmer taking some of the load off. However, that's only true if your talking about a reasonably priced skimmer. This article has some good info and there are some comparisons of skimmers (lower down). Interestingly, the RO and Bubble King were similar, but more impressively is how close the old-fashioned airstone performed. Although the maintenance and tweaking of the Bubble King or RO may be a bit more preferable :lol:

    Feature Article: Further Studies on Protein Skimmer Performance — Advanced Aquarist | Aquarist Magazine and Blog
     
  5. Daniel072

    Daniel072 Giant Squid

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    Theres a lot of big words and graphs. Can you tell us exactly what that says =P
     
  6. 2in10

    2in10 Super Moderator

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    I think the Eshopps brand skimmers are quite good with very reasonable pricing. A PSK-150 or PSK-200 should be plenty for your new tank.
     
  7. m2434

    m2434 Giant Squid

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    LOL, I said you could skim down to the comparisons. Basically, The important part for this thread, was the conclusion "bubbles are bubbles". There is a lot of discussion about what skimmers remove, some organics are more easily removed than others etc... The mathmatical modeling stuff is important to advance the hobby, but you can ignore it for this thread I think. The real relevance is efficiency doesn't go up much, if any, with cost. Maybe the skimmer is "better quality" though, that's another issue. I've had ROs for several years and have been happy, but I'm sure there are "better quality" skimmers.
     
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  9. thepanfish

    thepanfish Flying Squid

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    I would say that the Warner Marine skimmers or the Reef Octopus Diablo allow for lots of bangs for your bucks. The Diablo has a really wide neck transition which is one of the reasons I got mine. It also has the newer Sicce PSK 600 (the one without the startup issues) and a nice precise gate valve adjustment.
     
  10. Servillius

    Servillius Montipora Digitata

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    As happy as I've been with my RO, the Diablo or a WM is where I was headed. Nix to hear good things.
     
  11. azjohnny

    azjohnny Bristle Worm

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  12. Powerman

    Powerman Giant Squid

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    There really isn't a clear cut winner. Bubble machines are bubble machines. That's it. This hobby isn't any different than any other... money does not give you a linear increase in performance. Money gives you nicer features, better build, maybe better reliability, something more shinny, but it does not necessarily give you better performance.

    With skimmers, the best performance isn't from slapping together cookie cutter pieces.. they have to be tuned for what they are best used for. They have a range. So you can have a great name with crappy performance because you do not have it set up for what it was intended for. Just like you can have a great skimmer for cheap that is set up correctly.... but you do not get a great skimmer for cheap that has a quiet pump, reliable and long lasting built like a tank. We can argue the need to have it built like a tank, but you won't get that "cheap".

    There are some design out there that work very well, but have other draw backs like too noisy or too much power use. When you factor everything in, what "works best" is what is most commonly available... needle wheel skimmers. As with anything, you get what you pay for.... bottom of the barrel is what it is. A reasonably priced model will give you performance, reliability at a reasonable price. If you want to go from there and spend 3 times as much... well, it will be really really nice, and probably last a life time, but it will not perform 3 times as good.