Designing a monster

[Harleyguy]

I have been looking at some higher end skimmers and I haven't seen any that hold that kind of water volume. The BK goes for around $8000 and probably only holds 20 Gallons. I just did some rough math and the MR-9 only holds about 25-30 gallons. Jonathan’s skimmer is rather large and probably holds about 40 gallons (although this is just a guess). If I made a skimmer that held 120 Gallons it would be gynormis... Or am I an idiot??

[spazz]

Originally posted by Harleyguy
I have been looking at some higher end skimmers and I haven't seen any that hold that kind of water volume. The BK goes for around $8000 and probably only holds 20 Gallons. I just did some rough math and the MR-9 only holds about 25-30 gallons. Jonathan’s skimmer is rather large and probably holds about 40 gallons (although this is just a guess). If I made a skimmer that held 120 Gallons it would be gynormis... Or am I an idiot??

just build one that big.

[EnderG60]

Where in GA are ya?

as far as the skimmers go building one isnt that hard(especially when your looking in the $8000 range), and a 120g skimmer for a 1100g tank is not that gynormis(just think of those 120g water storage tanks, 3ft diam and 6ft tall). Just get a dart needlewheel or two on it. If you dont want to build one get with spazz(the guy up there^), he builds pretty big *** skimmers. Or if your close enough and dont mind waiting I can whip up something for ya.

I would also look into doing some type of wave or surge system, as that will get alot more movement for the money/energy. That and ive had great results on huge systems with the use of sea swirls(or wavey sea's) with Tunze's strapped to them.

Other stuff I would recommend for large systems like yours, would be a sulphur denitrator, dehumidifer(big one) a ground loop for cooling, and a setup for making/changing water with at a capacity of about 50% of your system(trust me on this one it will come in handy at some point)

Drop me a PM if you have any questions or anything

[Harleyguy]

Originally posted by EnderG60
Where in GA are ya?

as far as the skimmers go building one isnt that hard(especially when your looking in the $8000 range), and a 120g skimmer for a 1100g tank is not that gynormis(just think of those 120g water storage tanks, 3ft diam and 6ft tall). Just get a dart needlewheel or two on it. If you dont want to build one get with spazz(the guy up there^), he builds pretty big *** skimmers. Or if your close enough and dont mind waiting I can whip up something for ya.

I would also look into doing some type of wave or surge system, as that will get alot more movement for the money/energy. That and ive had great results on huge systems with the use of sea swirls(or wavey sea's) with Tunze's strapped to them.

Other stuff I would recommend for large systems like yours, would be a sulphur denitrator, dehumidifer(big one) a ground loop for cooling, and a setup for making/changing water with at a capacity of about 50% of your system(trust me on this one it will come in handy at some point)

Drop me a PM if you have any questions or anything

I'm in North Georgia more specifically Habersham. Like I said before I will most likely build my own skimmer (if I can find some plans) but I have to do my research, because if I can buy a skimmer that will do what I need it to for about the same as I would spend doing it myself then I would be a fool to build one.

What is the point of a sulphur denitrator? I don't think I'm going to use a dehumidifier. I am going to do something like Jonathans set-up using positive and negative air flow along with a Euro style AC unit. I have thought of doing a ground loop, but I need to do more research on the subject and figure out how to control the system... I will not be using a wave maker, and I plan on having a large mixing tank for water changes (I have the perfect place in my crawl-space for a 500 gallon tank).

[EnderG60]

The sulphur denitrator uses sulphur to feed anerobic(sp?) bacteria which also feed on nitrates. Not much downside to them besides the cost(unless you make it which is pretty easy) and it helps control your nitrates which makes the coral colors better. Coupled with a phosphate reactor they will greatly reduce the need for water changes on more heavily stocked tanks. Which in large tanks is a serious cost saver.


Honestly there isnt much to making skimmers

If it were me, for a your size I would say your two best/most cost effective options are

1. find a 120ish gallon cylinder holding tank(pretty common for under $150 on craigslist), get a sheet of 3/8" acylic, some uniseals, and bulkheads.

2. Just make a square one whatever size you can fit.

To make the cone.

get three sheets of plywood and cut out a hole in the middle of two of them about 4" larger in diameter(or square if your doing #2) then the holding tank. Sandwich the acrylic in between.

On the third sheet of wood trace out the same size circle and in the middle attach a 4-6" long piece of pipe(note PVC will melt a bit, but not a problem for one time use) that is 6"(or 8" depending on what size union you can get) diameter.

Heat up your sandwich till the acylic is floppy, if it fits in your oven then do it at 350, if not a heat gun and time will work.

Then take your sandwich and press it down onto sheet 3 with the pipe in the middle and clamp it down till it cools(this will make your cone)

For bubbles and current just get two dart needle wheels and make em suck from the top and push into the bottom in a swirl motion.

You can add a bubble plate/chamber if you like, but unless your going for skimming efficiency there isnt much beyond that.

If you want anything more complex then that I would say just talk with spazz.

Ground loops - Very easy as well. Either bury a pipe(about a 100+ feet of 3/4" thin wall PVC) in the yard about 10 feet down, or put it in your concrete floor when your poor it. Get a coil of Titanium tubing(expensive but you can find it on ebay) and a small pump on a temp controller. Put some water and antifreeze in the loop, put the Ti coil in your sump and set the controller. Only thing to watch out for is make sure the connections to the Ti coil are outside the tank in case of drips or leaks.

My old boss has a green house with some clam tanks in his yard, and he just ran the return pump through a ground loop and when it was 95 outside the water temps never got over 80.

For wavemaking look into a reverse carlson surge device(if i spelled it right) Its a simply system powered by an air pump that will get that tank moving.

[hahnmeister]

Hows the weather down there? I have a flight coming into ATL at 8pm Fri.

[Mikigo]

Harleyguy

Your solution for skimmer is for Spazz to build you one. Nothing but great reviews. In fact, I am waiting for him to finish mine.

Hey, Spazz stop hanging around these threads and finish my skimmer already.

[reef / aholic]

Klaus will build what ever you want!!!

[hahnmeister]

So will Anton at ATB... like a 24" diameter 4000lph cone skimmer...

[reef / aholic]

hahnmeister - that would be sweet!!!

[Harleyguy]

Originally posted by EnderG60
Where in GA are ya?


Other stuff I would recommend for large systems like yours, would be a sulphur denitrator, dehumidifer(big one) a ground loop for cooling, and a setup for making/changing water with at a capacity of about 50% of your system(trust me on this one it will come in handy at some point)

Drop me a PM if you have any questions or anything

I did a search on Sulfur denitrators, but found very little, but what I did find sounded really interesting. I think I would like to try one, but where can you get on? I found one place that sold them for tanks up to 500 gallons, but that's it. Do you, or anyone, know where I can get one that is good for a tank up to 2000 gallons?

[PRINCE_NAMOR]

Good luck on the tank!...........Be safe in Iraq........

[EnderG60]

http://mars.reefkeepers.net/USHomePa...Denitrator.htm

there ya go.

there really arnt many for sale. Ive only seen two, the 500g one you said and another thats built into a calc reactor.

these are one of the few things I really recommend you just build, they are basicly just an air tight container with a sulphur media and some aragonite to bring the ph back up.

Just make sure you are using a phosphate remover along with it.

[Harleyguy]

Originally posted by PRINCE_NAMOR
Good luck on the tank!...........Be safe in Iraq........

Thanks, and I will

[Harleyguy]

Originally posted by EnderG60
http://mars.reefkeepers.net/USHomePa...Denitrator.htm

there ya go.

there really arnt many for sale. Ive only seen two, the 500g one you said and another thats built into a calc reactor.

these are one of the few things I really recommend you just build, they are basicly just an air tight container with a sulphur media and some aragonite to bring the ph back up.

Just make sure you are using a phosphate remover along with it.

Thanks for the link. I think I will wait untill My system is up and going to see if I need one. The link said that they are not "normaly" needed in a reef tank.

[tjh]

recently set up a larger reef and second the thought of the tunze on a wavy sea. i have 4 in my tank and they really remove any dead spots. pic in gallery. i think schuran makes a large sulfur denitrator also
be safe

[Harleyguy]

I'm looking at the Tunze skimmers; does anyone here know anything about them? Specifically I'm looking at the Master DOC 9480.

[jnarowe]

Skip the Tunze skimmer dude. You can get better skimmers made in the US for less money and much better performance. You already have the best 2 or 3 mentioned above. I would never by the DOC over a Volcano or an ATB. And that skimmer with the red plastic is over-rated and over-priced, IMO.

As far as the Tunze pumps go, I have been talking to Roger about this for the last few days. For your size tank, I would seriously consider the 6301 or building in wave boxes. He said something interesting the other day. He said that the stock Tunze wavebox, on a 96" tank, would provide 15,000 gph in net flow. That's a lot of flow for very little electricity. In my discussions with him regarding a "wave tank", he also mentioned 2 other things.

1. The tank should be built oout of panes that are one size up from standard acceptable sizes. So instead of 1.25", it would be 1.5" etc.

2. He also stated explicitly that they do not recommend wave boxes as the sole flow producers due to the fact that they don't neccessarily move detritus to the overflows. The best way for me to describe this, is that the water in the center of the tank doesn't move very much.

I would think that in your case, using the built-in wave box, much like Hahn is describing, plus a pressure rated pump on a CL with Penductors would be the best combination. Maybe a couple of strategically placed Tunze rocks too.

I would shy away from the OM units. I know many people use them, but I have seen a lot of discussion about them jambing etc. and I personally don't trust moving parts like that. try to think about things from a maint. standpoint...I like to limit the work I have to do. One other area to investigate would be the WavySeas.

[Harleyguy]

Originally posted by jnarowe
Skip the Tunze skimmer dude. You can get better skimmers made in the US for less money and much better performance. You already have the best 2 or 3 mentioned above. I would never by the DOC over a Volcano or an ATB. And that skimmer with the red plastic is over-rated and over-priced, IMO.

As far as the Tunze pumps go, I have been talking to Roger about this for the last few days. For your size tank, I would seriously consider the 6301 or building in wave boxes. He said something interesting the other day. He said that the stock Tunze wavebox, on a 96" tank, would provide 15,000 gph in net flow. That's a lot of flow for very little electricity. In my discussions with him regarding a "wave tank", he also mentioned 2 other things.

1. The tank should be built oout of panes that are one size up from standard acceptable sizes. So instead of 1.25", it would be 1.5" etc.

2. He also stated explicitly that they do not recommend wave boxes as the sole flow producers due to the fact that they don't neccessarily move detritus to the overflows. The best way for me to describe this, is that the water in the center of the tank doesn't move very much.

I would think that in your case, using the built-in wave box, much like Hahn is describing, plus a pressure rated pump on a CL with Penductors would be the best combination. Maybe a couple of strategically placed Tunze rocks too.

I would shy away from the OM units. I know many people use them, but I have seen a lot of discussion about them jambing etc. and I personally don't trust moving parts like that. try to think about things from a maint. standpoint...I like to limit the work I have to do. One other area to investigate would be the WavySeas.

Thanks for all the info. The reason I was looking at the Tunze skimmer was because of the cost. This tank is going to cost me a mint and if I can save a couple of grand on the skimmer then why not. The Tunze biggest Tunze skimmer costs about $2200. That's a lot cheaper than a custom Volcano (almost half), although I would rather have the Volcano skimmer.

As far as wav boxes go there are 2 factors here.
1. I don't like the way they look; there is just something wrong with having a big bulky box sitting in our tank (although I do like the idea of a wave making system)
2. I asked my builder about going with 1" thick glass for my tank, and the price is way out of my range (it went up by almost 50%) and as you know tanks like this aren’t cheap to start with.

I have also heard about some OM units locking up, but I really like the idea of the unit. On my last tank (much smaller at 220 Gallons) I had Penductors and never cold get the flow right, in some places the flow was so great that if a fish swam in front of it the fish would be blown over (it was kind of funny) and in other areas of the tank the flow was almost non existent. I think you may be right though, maybe the perfect combo would be 4 or 8 Tunzes and 6 or 8 Penductors.

As for the WavySeas, like I said before I want to hide as much as I can, so the thought of a WavySea hanging down with a Tunze on it is really not idea, at least for me. It might be the best solution, but this time I think form will win over function.

On a side not I will be ordering my tank on the 5th, so I really need to figure out what it is I am going to do. Thanks for all your input I really do appreciate it.


I don't know anything about these skimmers, who makes them?

[jnarowe]

Wave boxes don't have to be "inside" the tank. They can be easily hidden just like an overflow, butagain, there's a cost involved.

[Harleyguy]

I can put them outside of the tank?? You have my attention... Do you think the 19mm (3/4") glass will be antique?

[jnarowe]

I don't know anything about glass. Look at the standard wave box and then picture something similar scabbed onto the side of the tank. here's a couple of quickie drawings:


View from viewing pane sans aquascape:



Cut-away view from back:



These can be on the sides or wherever you want based on your aquascape plan.

[Harleyguy]

As if you couldn't already tell, I have really played off your design. It's your fault that my tank is going to be so big and I think my wife wants to have a word with you.... So on that note I am also planning on having a full length overflow across the back of the tank. So for this I would add another overflow to the side? This, I guess, would give me the best and longest waves. Also in you picture you show 3 boxes.... Is that what I'll need? I thought it would be one box with 2 extensions. If you use 3 boxes how do you get them to all work together? Also, with the boxes in the overflow, what do you do, just have a hole cut in the glass for the return flow? I assume that this would not need to be sealed, or would it? Also could this "overflow" be just for the waveboxes? Thus keeping the drains in a different overflow?

[Harleyguy]

Merry Christmas

It is now midnight in lovely Iraq

[Harleyguy]

I am ordering 800 pounds of rocks from Macro Rocks, I know that it is really early, but I'm getting a good deal and Marc from Macro Rocks said he would hand pick large and interesting rocks for my tank and send me picture for my approval. I also plan on getting about 400 pounds of liverock when I get home and we will see how much I need from there.