Drains from tank straight into skimmer?

[afbengochea]

Anyone ever plumb the drain from your tank straight into the skimmer down at my sump? I figure that way all of the water coming from the tank would potentially get skimmed. What do you guys think? Would that work well?

[zxcv123]

Well if ur using a wet dry or a refugium, then yes, have the "raw" water come straight to the skimmer then over the bio balls so the organtic compunds that a skimmer takes out never go through the nitrification process. You will have less nitrates too. If ur just using a sump, as in a tank of water with no biological media, then it doesnt matter.

[tdwyatt]

If you mean directly from the tank into the lower skimmer chamber through the skimmer intake, then there will be issues related to prblems with controlling the level of the water (and hence the water foam level) in the skimmer with any outlet-controlled skimmer models. This means that the foam output (and the resulting skimmate) from the skimmer will then vary the skimmate output of the device, varying from ineffective to possibly overflowing depending on how far the period goes at what level in the skimmer. It is much better to have the skimmer sitting in the sump with a pump tuned for the output of the skimmer, placing the skimmer high enough so that any fluctuations in sump depth will not affect the skimmer foam column height. This may mean placing the skimmer on a block of inert substance (live rock, brick, etc.) so that the water level does not rise above the dialed in setting for skimmer output. For some skimmers, it may be better to place the skimmer outside the sump and use a drain line to return water back to the sump, employing a vented stack for the vertical drop in the drain line through a T-fitting at the end of the drain line.


Should be lots of info related to drain plumbing for Geoff's designs for the G-skimmer in the archives for the DIY forum.


HTH

[zxcv123]

what tom here is saying is true, I was speaking biologically of course. You cant have an overflow feed directly from a skimmer. Maybe u want it in line or something like that or it could be in the sump before any refugiums or biological media. So the overflow water would regulate a water level in the sump, and a pump would pull water from the sump to the skimmer and back into the sump into the opposite direction. just make sure the skimmer is skimming water before it reaches refugiums/ wet dry bio balls, or any other bio media.

[zxcv123]

It is much better to have the skimmer sitting in the sump with a pump tuned for the output of the skimmer, placing the skimmer high enough so that any fluctuations in sump depth will not affect the skimmer foam column height.

precisley. skimmers are designed (to my knoweledge) for a specific GPH wich can only be acurattley administirred by a pump included with the skimmer or a pump reccomended by the skimmer manufacturer/ LFS that will suit the perticular model and aplacation. For example, if i ripped the air line off the maxi on my bak pak, and had a mag 3 feed water into the skimmer, it would overflow because it was designed for the aprx: 250 gph that the maxi provides.

[zxcv123]

so the overflow water could be more or less than the skimmer can handle

[JASONWM64]

I Have A Cpr Back Pack On My Sump And I Made It So All The Water That Comes From The Tank Gos Through It First Then In To The Sump Over The Bio Balls And I Have No Problem With My Water Flow.