Buying a used skimmer

[kinkfish79]

I have a chance to buy this Aqua Medic Turboflotor T1000 Protein Skimmer with Ocean Runner 2500 pump for $120.00. I have a 140 gallon tank with a 40 gallon sump. Any opionions on if this is a good choice. I am on a little bit of a budget.
thanks

 

[kraylen]

Mehhh.. The skimmer is OK, I wouldnt use it on 180g system personally. I would look into getting a used AquaC skimmer from CL as they are much better and not to expensive. I use a remora and it's great. Their insump skimmers are pretty good too.
What are you keeping in your tank livestock wise?

 

[kinkfish79]

Well I set up the tank at the begining of OCT I started it with 2 chromis and about 50 lbs of live rock 30 lbs of live sand mixed with 60 lbs of regular sand. Some of the live rocks have really nice shrooms on them. I went out of the country for 2 months and when I got back I added a cleaner shrimp, blue fairy wrasse and a flame angel. I lost the wrasse
I dont know why because my nitrates are not very high

 

[kinkfish79]

P.S I am not adding anything until I buy this skimmer and get at least 50 lbs of more live rock

 

[kraylen]

Skimmer should work fine for the application. I see no problems. If you ever need a stronger skimmer you can always upgrade or mod the hell out of this one.
Either way, if it skims and does not leak.. go for it.

 

[kinkfish79]

I am sorry for the ignorance but he is willing to let me plug it in to my buddies tank to test it out. What do I need to look for how do I tell if it leaks?

 

[kraylen]

Originally Posted by kinkfish79
http:///forum/post/3188998
I am sorry for the ignorance but he is willing to let me plug it in to my buddies tank to test it out. What do I need to look for how do I tell if it leaks?

Um, water will come out of it where it is not supposed to?

 

[bmkj02]

Spend an additional $40-$50 and get an Octopus

 

[handbanana]

I noticed you mentioned modding a skimmer. Could you offer any tips for this? I bought a no name skimmer and its not working properly, It had a small flow valve on the out put that i removed because water was just pouring over into the collection cup, this made no difference. How much does water level in the sump affect the performance of the skimmer? I am in the process of rebuilding my sump and am stuck on my skimmer issues. its driving me crazy. should i extend the height of the skimmer somehow? can the skimmer be raised out of the water and have a tube from the pump intake down to the water level? I know the answer is buy a new skimmer but my restriction is having only 17" of height to work with. thats with clearence to remove the collection cup. I havnt seen any skimmers that can handle 120 gal that fall into this catagory.