roly01 Posted October 8, 2011 Share Posted October 8, 2011 Hey guys, i decided to do a little tutorial for a mod i did to my aquatic life skimmer that greatly improved its performance for me. I got this idea from a mod i saw for this skimmer online and i just decided to take it a little further. basically what this mod does is it replaces the hose for the intake to a longer one the stretches higher above the water for better air intake, but in my mod i add a valve to better control the air flow of the intake. here are the steps Supplies Needed: Scissors Pliers About 12'' of standard air line tubing Air line valve like the one in the image shown below, this valve came with my Mj 1200 power head and it is what gave me the idea -Before anything take apart your skimmer like the image shown below. once you have it open, the first think you will do is remove the intake hose, i pointed it out in the image blow shown as line 1. second you will have to pry off the adapter that connects the hose to the outside of the skimmer, i pointed it out in the image as line number 2. -Once you've finished the steps above your going to pass your air line tubing through the hole where the adapter was. should look like this -Once you have the hose going through the skimmer you are going to attach the hose the the pump from where you removed the original hose, like this. -Finally it should look like this. -Now your done with doing any more modding to the inside of the skimmer, and your ready to close it up and place it back in your tank. -Now its time to add your valve to the end of your hose, like this. Here's the video of me regulating the air intake of the skimmer showing how it works. Picture of Skimmate 2 days after water change Link to comment
nickjqz Posted October 8, 2011 Share Posted October 8, 2011 That is a pretty sweet video. Link to comment
roly01 Posted October 8, 2011 Author Share Posted October 8, 2011 thanks man, this mod gives you pretty much full control of the skimmer. ive been able to adjust the skimmer to give me a much darker/thicker skimmate then it was giving before the mod. Link to comment
th64 Posted October 18, 2011 Share Posted October 18, 2011 very nice man I am thinking about this skimmer on my 20L and have read good things about it. I may give it a shot... got any pics of the skimmate you emptied out of there? Link to comment
roly01 Posted October 18, 2011 Author Share Posted October 18, 2011 Yea it should do pretty good in a 20L, I'll try to get a picture of the skimmate next time I empty it out.. Link to comment
Gr8_Outdoorsman Posted October 18, 2011 Share Posted October 18, 2011 Excellent write-up! Much appreciated! Link to comment
TimWarchol Posted October 18, 2011 Share Posted October 18, 2011 just did the mod over the weekend. works great! Thank you!! Link to comment
roly01 Posted October 18, 2011 Author Share Posted October 18, 2011 your welcome guys glad i can help ! Link to comment
th64 Posted October 19, 2011 Share Posted October 19, 2011 So I am getting a good amount of water in the collection cup. I adjusted the air being fed in so that the bubbles are lower but is this a part of the break in process? Link to comment
nickjqz Posted October 20, 2011 Share Posted October 20, 2011 How high is the water when your skimmer is in the chamber? Link to comment
roly01 Posted October 20, 2011 Author Share Posted October 20, 2011 the water is about half an inch under the inlet of where the air hose comes in though Link to comment
nickjqz Posted October 20, 2011 Share Posted October 20, 2011 What is the consistency of the skimmate? Sorry for all of the questions, I am a first time skimmerer. Link to comment
roly01 Posted October 20, 2011 Author Share Posted October 20, 2011 Th64 I completely missed your question earlier but if this is a new skimmer you are talking about, I would leave the hose valve completely open and just adjust the knob on the side till you break in the skimmer. It should take about 3-5 days to fully break in, then start adjusting the valve to try and get some darker skimmate.. And nick the skimmate should be anywhere from a yellowish tinted water, to a dark greenish brown color, and it all depends on how much waste you have in your tank for the slimmer to pull out.. I usually empty my cup every 3 days or so with some brownish color water, with some thicker gunk on the bottom of the cup but it usually depends on my feeding during the time period. Link to comment
nickjqz Posted October 20, 2011 Share Posted October 20, 2011 Ok, thank you. I guess I have been getting some pretty good stuff out of there. Link to comment
roly01 Posted October 20, 2011 Author Share Posted October 20, 2011 I'll post a picture tomorrow when I empty out the cup so you guys can compare Link to comment
hooligan_78 Posted October 20, 2011 Share Posted October 20, 2011 I did this when I still had mine, made HUGE difference to a skimmer that I thought already worked well enough. Nice write up! Link to comment
saltohio Posted October 20, 2011 Share Posted October 20, 2011 Thanks! I was wondering what the extra foot of tubing with the aire valve was for, tonight's mini project. Link to comment
th64 Posted October 20, 2011 Share Posted October 20, 2011 @roly thanks I figured to leave the valve open, and I was wondering if it was normal for it to pull so much water along w/ the gunk? I thought it would not pull too much water. But definetly getting some brown water in the cup. Going to give it a while to fully do its thing to break in Link to comment
roly01 Posted October 20, 2011 Author Share Posted October 20, 2011 Saltohio I said a foot of tubing just in case but from what I remember all you really need is about 6" in. Of tubing but I just said a foot to safe. Th64 if your getting allot of water try maybe opening the nob a little more so that it can release a little more water, it can also be that it's just breaking in. How often is it filling up to the point that you are emptying it out? Link to comment
th64 Posted October 21, 2011 Share Posted October 21, 2011 I opened up the nob all the way now and I emptied it out last night but its about 3/4 full already. I am just gona give it time Link to comment
IMaNoob Posted October 21, 2011 Share Posted October 21, 2011 the skimmer might be too low. have you tried raising it abit? Link to comment
roly01 Posted October 21, 2011 Author Share Posted October 21, 2011 imanoob has a good point as wel,l it may have to do with the level of the water your skimmer is in. Anyways give it some time and if after a couple more days it continues, then maybe its is the water level or something else. here's a pic of the skimmate im getting after about two days of skimming. its actually rather light but thats because i have just done a big water change two days ago i usually pull out a little darker skimmate but that is still not bad. Link to comment
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