Protien skimmer

saltlife

Member
Pretty new to salt. Done with my cycle and are now adding fish. Picked up a protien skimmer. A seaclone because thats what the lfs recommended of just handed me. Reading all the threads i think it was a mistake. My only problem with it is all the bubbles. I went to the website for trouble shooting tips. It says this happens when adding certain things like stress coat, which i did because i was adding a new fish the same day. My questions are 1) should i wait until the stress coat wears off and try it again? 2) does anyones' skimmer makes these bubbles without adding products like this? 3) does all protien skimmers make aloe of bubbles? 4) what are 1 of the better hang on protien skimmers? I know its alot, just don't know if i should wait and see what happens or just scrap this 1 and get a new one tomorrow.
 

sacfishguy

Member
To stop the bubbles you can close the air knob (what I recommend) or unplug the skimmer it will take a week or two for the silicates to breakdown and settle. I ran into this problem when I first got a skimmer (which was a sea clone 150).
All skimmers maker bubbles of some sort; they just shouldn’t fill your tank. Some skimmers come with bubble diffusers. There are a lot of name brand skimmers that work really well. It is basically what you can afford. I would recommend a coralife supper skimmer just because for the money you spend they work really well. I currently have 2 of them (220 gal model and the 65 gal model). As for the seaclone skimmer I run a saeclone 150 just because I had it lying around and it does an ok job. If you wanted to you could just run it till you decide to up grade to a bigger tank or decide you need something bigger and better.
JMO ***)
 

nm reef

Active Member
There are much better hang on type skimmer options....I've used a CPR bac pac skimmer with success.....I'd suggest a few searchs on-line or here on these forums for information on hang on skimmers.
 

chipmaker

Active Member
Seaclones may not be the most desireable or best skimmers made, but they can and do work if you spend a bit of time tinkering or modding them. Most all of the skimmers that get a bad rap will indeed work if a person has the will and patients to fool with them.
Skimmers by nature make bubbles simply so they can float the skim up and out as it sticks to the bubbles.......Any organic or foreigin junk / additives / even feeds etc can make a skimmer produce more than usual, so excessive foaming or bubbles is fairly common. If I let my Coralife skimmers on when I feed frozen foods, they will bubble wildly, however if I shut off skimmer during feeding time for perhaps an hour, they just pickup where they left off when I shut them down and there is no more noiticeablke foam or bubbles produced, as the corals etc have utilized a lot of what the skimmer would have started to pickup.....
I think you would be hard pressed to beat the coral life line of skimmers unless money is no object, then of course there are higher priced skimmers, but IMHO if its doing the job and only costs $100 how can a skimmer costing $300 do a better job......either they work or they don;t, and more money especially when comparing to a coral life does not necessarily mean yur gonna get better conditions in yur tank by any means......
 

lazarus

Member
i have a CPR BakPak that is designed for about 75 g (the literature says it can go up to 125g but i am not so sure). i have had no problems with it. it is 4 mos old (new) and i am upgrading to a larger tank, so cannot use it. if you are interested, i can sell it to you before i list it on the Classifieds. Retails for $120-130 but i will sell for $70.
 

lilsis13

New Member
:help: I was reading this message and I am actually in dire need of answers on my coralife super skimmer 65. I just bought one today and set it up. I do not see ANY bubbles! Shouldn't I be seeing some sort of swirling vortex in the actual cannister? Can anyone here help me. Sorry to bust in on the party.
 
Top