quote
Originally posted by Clayton
Just a thought, but cleaning your skimmer is about more than just emptying the cup... Ideally, you should be cleaning the cup out every day. The most important element of that being wiping out the inside of the throat that leads up into the cup. Cleaning that throat out greatly enhances the efficiency of the skimmer. Even if you don't get a full cup of skimmate, you should still be cleaning out the cup (and especially that throat) at least three times per week or so. It's a shame to lose the efficiency when that's what you paid extra money to get.
-Clayton
</blockquote id="quote">
Calfo supports what Clayton has posted above! In his book of Coral Propagation he writes of being an adament proponent of skimming and skimmer efficiency is one of the most neglected parameters of reef-aquarium husbandry! Skimate should be recovered daily, but that is hard for many of us to do. He also states neglecting to clean the skimmer necks and bodies weekly or less often is not conducive to optimum skimming. Skimmers differ, but the more often it's cleaned the more peak performance you get out of it. I recently took the skimmer out of the sump and did a thorough cleaning and seen a big difference in the skim that it collected. We all do things different but thought that Claytons post was very informative and I just wanted to support the info that he shared!
Drilled my EuroReef 5-3 collection cup
3
Ok, I finally took the plunge and got the collection cup of my euroreef drilled.
I first went to Home Depot to buy the fittings. Bought a brass one that was straight up and down. Also got a plastic one that had a 45 degree elbow bend, but the end was a little too small I thought.
Next day, I went to a local hardware store that specialized in all sorts of fittings. I found 2 that I wanted to use. One was a 1/2 inch and the other was a 1/8 inch. Here's what the 1/2 inch one looks like
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I had absolutely NO intentions of drilling this myself as I believe this is about a $100 replacement part. So I took it to my local plastics workshop, Plastic Tech in Ann ARbor.
They charged me $10.00 to drill the hole.
I ended up having to use the smaller of the 2 fittings because of the limited width on the bottom of the collection cup. Still, this fitting has a larger diameter than the one I got from Home Depot so I was still pleased. Just a little bummed that I couldn't use the larger fitting. But that is why I bought 2, just in case.
If you had a bigger collection cup, I'm sure you could use the bigger sized fittings no problem. My reasoning for wanting the bigger fitting is so that there was less chance of the fitting clogging from the accumulation of goo. When I empty my cup for cleaning, there are literally chunks that come out in the skimmate. Very gross!
I had some Weldon 16 that I used to glue the fitting into place. It was tricky to get glue on the inside of the cup. I ended up taking the fitting, squirting a bunch of glue on the threads and pushing the fitting back into the hole. I let the glue ooze around the bottom on the outside of the cup. To that, I took a q-tip and swabbed around the perimeter of the screw threads.
Here's the finished product
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I have not as of this posting hooked up the unit. I am letting the glue set for 24 hours as per the instructions. I will be reassembling the skimmer this evening.
I first went to Home Depot to buy the fittings. Bought a brass one that was straight up and down. Also got a plastic one that had a 45 degree elbow bend, but the end was a little too small I thought.
Next day, I went to a local hardware store that specialized in all sorts of fittings. I found 2 that I wanted to use. One was a 1/2 inch and the other was a 1/8 inch. Here's what the 1/2 inch one looks like
I had absolutely NO intentions of drilling this myself as I believe this is about a $100 replacement part. So I took it to my local plastics workshop, Plastic Tech in Ann ARbor.
They charged me $10.00 to drill the hole.
I ended up having to use the smaller of the 2 fittings because of the limited width on the bottom of the collection cup. Still, this fitting has a larger diameter than the one I got from Home Depot so I was still pleased. Just a little bummed that I couldn't use the larger fitting. But that is why I bought 2, just in case.
If you had a bigger collection cup, I'm sure you could use the bigger sized fittings no problem. My reasoning for wanting the bigger fitting is so that there was less chance of the fitting clogging from the accumulation of goo. When I empty my cup for cleaning, there are literally chunks that come out in the skimmate. Very gross!
I had some Weldon 16 that I used to glue the fitting into place. It was tricky to get glue on the inside of the cup. I ended up taking the fitting, squirting a bunch of glue on the threads and pushing the fitting back into the hole. I let the glue ooze around the bottom on the outside of the cup. To that, I took a q-tip and swabbed around the perimeter of the screw threads.
Here's the finished product
I have not as of this posting hooked up the unit. I am letting the glue set for 24 hours as per the instructions. I will be reassembling the skimmer this evening.
