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04/06/2016, 07:15 PM | #1 |
Registered Member.
Join Date: Jun 2004
Location: Rockford IL
Posts: 285
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Going No Skimmer
Since the search feature has been disabled... (great idea) smh... I'd like to get some feedback on the guys that have shut their skimmer down.
I am changing 20% of my water every Sunday. The amount of Skimate I was getting wasn't worth the cost of 100 watts 24/7... I'm concerned if there are any long term issues I should be concerned with since I am replacing 99% of my water after rough 5 weeks. 150 Gallon Mixed. |
04/06/2016, 07:19 PM | #2 |
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Join Date: Feb 2013
Posts: 56
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So confused. No long term. It's actually better. The skimmer allows you to do less water changes. Electricity > salt +water
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04/06/2016, 07:49 PM | #3 |
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Join Date: Jun 2004
Location: Rockford IL
Posts: 285
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Water changer are essential to add trace elements without dosing. 160 gallon bucket / 30 gallons weekly= $10 which over the course of a year is $520 / 10 buckets of salt.
It's not cheap but the difference of polyp extension I've seen since starting this 3 weeks ago is night and day. Growth is noticable sometimes on a daily basis. If I could find a really good skimmer that wouldn't consume so much energy I may switch back. But right now things are flourishing... |
04/06/2016, 09:01 PM | #4 |
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Posts: 116
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Do you test those trace elements? Are you sure they are being used up between water changes? There are a million ulns tanks with great polyp extension. That being said I toyed with the idea of running skimmer 12 hours and feeding less. In the end I just got a smaller skimmer. Lookup some dc skimmers way better on power.
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04/08/2016, 02:44 PM | #5 |
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Location: NYC transplant now in CT
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why not run your skimmer on a schedule with an apex?
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I'd Rather be a failure at something I love , Than a sucess at something I hate . George Burns Current Tank Info: 150 DD Cube / 100 Gal Sump(basement) 30gal cube frag tank plumb Panworld 250ps return/ Reef Octopus SRO3000 Skimmer/ Bubble Magus Doser/Lumenmax reflector with 400 watt Radium bulb Ice Cap Ballast Apex Controller 2 MP40wes 2 gyre 150 |
04/08/2016, 03:07 PM | #6 |
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Location: Iowa
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What kind of skimmer are you running? There's LOTS of skimmers around now that draw a lot less.
Like an AquaMaxx EM300 would do well on at a 150. Draws around 30 watts. Or if you want a little higher end an ATB 840 would be perfect.
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rebuild and recovery log: No more red house, you'll have to click on my name and visit my homepage! You can check out my parameters at reeftronics dot net website and look for my username. Current Tank Info: 180g mixed reef w/ a beananimal overflow to a dolomite RRUGF. | 20g long G. Smithii Mantis Tank |
04/08/2016, 03:37 PM | #7 |
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Location: Mendham, NJ USA
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I have been running a 125 gallon BB mixed reef for over 10 years with no dosing. I do 5 gallon water changes almost every weekend. Most acros are slow growing but the montiporas and all soft corals are very happy.
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04/08/2016, 08:01 PM | #8 |
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Join Date: Jul 2010
Location: Austin, TX
Posts: 1,985
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I quit using skimmers in '97 and haven't regretted it. Here's links to some of my skimmerless tanks:
23 yeqr old system http://youtu.be/KhcRz50cV0s 500 system http://youtu.be/_Uf5IyXvajg 240 filterless system http://youtu.be/-eCQSVdqBQA 17 year old system http://youtu.be/5AnmQXmE8d0 Sump of 17 year old system http://youtu.be/WDj0daKV2B8 Green Slimer Timeline https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DyM6Y39iQ8M Feldman, et al, did an intersting series of articles looking at GAC, skimmers and TOC (Total Organic Carbon). (I skip over a lot of the description of how the experiments were set up.) Granular Activated Carbon Pt 1 http://www.advancedaquarist.com/2008/1/aafeature1 Granular Activated Carbon Pt 2 http://www.advancedaquarist.com/2008/2/aafeature1 Total Organic Carbon Pt 1 http://www.advancedaquarist.com/2008/8/aafeature3 Total Organic Carbon Pt 2 http://www.advancedaquarist.com/2008/9/aafeature2 Protein Skimmer Performance, Pt 1 http://www.advancedaquarist.com/2009/1/aafeature2 Protein Skimmer Performance, Pt 2 http://www.advancedaquarist.com/2010/1/aafeature Skimmate Analysis http://www.advancedaquarist.com/2010/2/aafeature Bacterial Counts in Reef Aquarium Water http://www.advancedaquarist.com/2011/3/aafeature Feldman's research showing skimmers are not good at removing TOC, also called DOM (Dissolved Organic Matter) got me looking into TOC closer. Unfortunately we as hobbiest cannot test for it but TOC can be divided into POC (Particulate Organic Carbon), about 10%, and DOC (Dissolved Organic Carbon), about 90%. The DOC can be crudely divided into Labile or easily consumed by microbes; Semi-Labile, less easily consumed by microbes and Refractory or very resistant to being broken down or removed. The refractory portion of DOC is roughly 2/3rds the total of DOC. Some of the papers I've found include: DOC released by corals promotes autotrophic (good) microbes, DOC released by algae promotes heterotrophic (bad) microbes. (We need to think of corals in our systems as autotrophs) http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/23303369 http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3719129/ DOC released by algae kills corals, not phosphate or nitrogen http://www.int-res.com/articles/meps...4/m314p119.pdf http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/16796574 Sponges "eat" DOC and convert it into DIC (alklainity) https://www.researchgate.net/publica...ce_Sponge_loop http://www.rug.nl/research/portal/fi...letethesis.pdf My own experience over the decades has been small frequent water changes are what's essential to keeping reef aquariums for decades, not skimmers. Now with the science now showing skimmers do not remove a significant portion of DOC, skimmers are likely removing only the labile types of DOC which includes the good types released by corals that promote autotrophic microbes and is food for sponges, and skimmers do alter the microbial populations in systems compared to pristine reefs I'll argue they may be irrelevant or even detrimental to the long term success (as in decades and decades) of reef systems.
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"Our crystal clear aquaria come nowhere close to the nutrient loads that swirl around natural reefs" Charles Delbeek Last edited by Timfish; 04/08/2016 at 08:07 PM. |
04/08/2016, 08:43 PM | #9 | |
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Location: Iowa
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Quote:
No doubt you have some beautiful tanks. No doubt it can be done. No doubt zero water changes can possibly be successful too (GlennF). Many of the articles above can be twisted any which way to support a cause. Pick your poison and stick with it I say. That IMO is the most important thing to creating success.
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rebuild and recovery log: No more red house, you'll have to click on my name and visit my homepage! You can check out my parameters at reeftronics dot net website and look for my username. Current Tank Info: 180g mixed reef w/ a beananimal overflow to a dolomite RRUGF. | 20g long G. Smithii Mantis Tank |
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04/15/2016, 08:16 PM | #10 | ||
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Join Date: Jul 2010
Location: Austin, TX
Posts: 1,985
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Quote:
Quote:
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"Our crystal clear aquaria come nowhere close to the nutrient loads that swirl around natural reefs" Charles Delbeek |
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04/15/2016, 08:25 PM | #11 | |
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Join Date: Jul 2009
Location: Iowa
Posts: 9,671
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Quote:
I don't believe success lies in any single item like a skimmer. I, however, see nothing negative still in using a skimmer and in my situation only positive in regards to the aeration more so then the skimming of extra stuff in the water. There's a lot of "stuff" Which circles right into those microbes. I also believe they are extremely important and necessary part of the system. I don't believe my system is limited at all in that regard. Thanks for the book recommendation I'm definitely going to check it out.
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rebuild and recovery log: No more red house, you'll have to click on my name and visit my homepage! You can check out my parameters at reeftronics dot net website and look for my username. Current Tank Info: 180g mixed reef w/ a beananimal overflow to a dolomite RRUGF. | 20g long G. Smithii Mantis Tank |
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04/27/2016, 08:18 AM | #12 |
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Join Date: Mar 2004
Location: TX
Posts: 502
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TimFish
From the articles, GAC is better at removing DOC and that Protein skimmers max out about 30% TOC/DOM. Carbon dosing and protein skimmers “Finally, mechanical filtration in the form of skimming but not GAC does provide an effective means of bacteria export, at least up to a point. It appears likely that some types of bacteria are indeed "skimmable", but others are not. Thus, skimming inadvertently provides severe (?) evolutionary pressure to skew the tank's resident water column bacteria population to favor the "non-skimmable" cohort.” (http://www.advancedaquarist.com/2011/3/aafeature) For protein skimmers to work as a form of nutrient export you would have to regularly add bacteria that are skimmable for nutrient export. Would GAC remove or mitigate the DOC released by algae (Algae scrubber) for nutrient export? What would you change to this list in setting up tank today, from the articles and your experiences? Sand, Rock, Coral, Sponges, water changes, running GAC, GFO,and Biomass to uptake DOC. Thanks Ken |
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