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jureivis
08/14/2015, 07:19 AM
Hello,


i started my first reef 5 days ago. 800 ltr 50 kg live rock, phosphate reactor, carbon, and bbk deluxe 300. My recent headache is a tuning of a skimmer - i can not get this brown stuff inside of a cup. Played for some time with watter levels inside and outside of a skimmer - does not change a lot.

Shortly speaking i have nozzle on the pump closed (dots aligned), outlet pipe fully open, telescope lifted to the max, my outlet of the skimmer takes the watter directly to refugium, outlet is not fully submerged under watter.


After few days of reading different forums about how to fine-tune the skimmer i have no more ideas of what could be wrong in my setup?


could anyone have a look at my pictures (watter levels, outlet position, telescope, foam level in the neck) and give me some advice? Is there a fault in setting, or am I simply impatient :)


It is a second-hand skimmer if it changes something in terms of breaking-in period?


Thank you in advance.

Vinny Kreyling
08/14/2015, 08:39 AM
With only 5 days in there is not enough for the skimmer to work on, so it just makes bubbles.
No Bio Load yet.

gcarroll
08/14/2015, 10:26 AM
Hopefully slief will show up and help you out. He is definitely the local Royal Exclusiv guru on these boards! Personally I think the Bubble King has way to many different items to tune. For some the extra ways to tune is welcome but for many, it can be a curse. In my opinion, for a company, it is a customer service nightmare!

slief
08/14/2015, 10:46 AM
First off, your tank is new and there really isn't much in the way of dissolved organics (DOC's) for the skimmer to drive out of the water. Also, the skimmer will need a break in period which is anywhere for a week to two weeks before it's really settled in.

That said, that skimmer is WAY to large for your system and will most certainly be very inconsistent on it. Also, the Deluxe skimmers are more suitable for dry skimming and because of that, you will need to run it really wet to get any kind of production on a tank your size. In my opinion, it is really the wrong choice for your tank. It's much too large with too large of a neck for even a well stocked tank your size. The Bubble Kings are the one skimmer that you don't need or want to oversize.

I'd start the skimmer out in 9" of water with the nozzle 1.5 turns out from fully closed and the wedge pipe completely open. Then let it run for a day or so to settle in. You are going to want the water to transition from bubbles to foam in the lower to mid part of the neck. You can raise the level by closing the wedge pipe but I like to adjust my sump level so that the foam is where I want it while having the wedge pipe wide open. Then use the wedge for fine tuning. In your case, because you don't have any load, you will need to play with the sump level and raise it even more to get the skimmer to produce but given you don't have any DOC's, your not going to have much if any dark skimmate. At least not until you get some good stock but given that you only have a 200 gallon display, you really won't be able to stock it heavily enough to keep that skimmer fed with enough DOC's to keep it consistent and happy.