# Protein Skimmer Sizing



## poobar (Feb 20, 2011)

I am thinking of upgrading my tank and this hyperthetical question came to mind.

I have a normally stocked 50 gallon aquarium and I have a protein skimmer rated to 50 gallons. I then upgrade to a 100 gallon aquarium but don't add any new life (ie. a low stocked 100 gallon) would I need to upgrade my skimmer????


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## sig (Dec 13, 2010)

you already need update. What I found when was looking for skimmer that almost all companies lie about capability. It should be "super skimmer" which is rated for 50G and be able to handle 50G. Just my opinion

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## Tristan (Aug 15, 2011)

In my experience its better to have a skimmer rated at least 50% higher capacity than what you have. So for you I would get a skimmer that can handle a 80-90 gallon heavily loaded tank. This way your getting a lot of gunk out of your system. An ASM mini G would work well for you. I have one on a 65 and it pulls the darkest stuff I have ever seen.


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## mattdean (Oct 23, 2010)

Unless you are buying a Bubble King or similar quality skimmer (companies that realistically rate their skimmers), you need to get a higher rated skimmer. It comes down to the quality. I had a Turbo Multifloator SL skimmer that was rated for up to 200 gallons that couldn't handle my 46 gallon.


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## poobar (Feb 20, 2011)

But does the size of the skimmer rate to the volume of water in the system, or the bioload of the system???


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## mattdean (Oct 23, 2010)

poobar said:


> But does the size of the skimmer rate to the volume of water in the system, or the bioload of the system???


The answer to your question is....YES. I have a reasonable heavy bioload in my 125 (160 total volume). I have a Bubble King 200 skimmer. My nutrient levels are never a problem.

However, if you have a light bioload in a 100, you still need to consider the water volume, but it's really the bioload that is the major factor, IMO. It's not just the bioload, though. It's your water flow, amount of liverock, other forms of filtration, etc. You have to look at the system as a whole.

That being said, it never hurst to have a little extra skimming power. It will help keep things under control if something happens - death, coral sliming, etc.


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## Chris S (Dec 19, 2007)

A skimmer is rated on how much water the pump can process, so no matter what your bioload, you should be using a skimmer that will handle the gallonage of your tank.

Keeping things simple: a skimmer that is rated for 50g would technically only process 50% of the water in a 100g tank, even though it would do 100% in a 50g. That means that even though you still have the same bioload, less water is actually being passed through the skimmer and therefore the skimmer will not be removing as much crap.

The skimmer should match the flow of your return pump, or in the case of no sump, it should be able to properly turn over the volume of water.


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## Nightstar (Nov 26, 2011)

Some reefers maintain beautiful tanks without foam fractionation so there is no hard and fast rule regarding sizing. Additionally a well tuned undersized skimmer will remove more gunk than a poorly tuned oversized skimmer. 

Tell us more about the skimmer you have and how well it skims.


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## bigfishy (Jun 19, 2009)

Chris S said:


> The skimmer should match the flow of your return pump, or in the case of no sump, it should be able to properly turn over the volume of water.


Let say my protein skimmer's pump is 350gph, does that mean my return pump has to be 350gph too? or can it be higher? or lower?

What happen if I use a lower rate return pump? or vice versa?



Nightstar said:


> Some reefers maintain beautiful tanks without foam fractionation so there is no hard and fast rule regarding sizing. Additionally a well tuned undersized skimmer will remove more gunk than a poorly tuned oversized skimmer.
> 
> Tell us more about the skimmer you have and how well it skims.


I don't get what you mean by tuned?


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## Richard A (Feb 7, 2011)

I usually flow 2 times the aquariums water volume through a skimmer per hour this keeps it well processed. There is some good reading in the Moe book on this topic.

Cheers


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## explor3r (Mar 14, 2010)

Im not an expert on this matter but I know that the protein skimmer is the hearth of the reef and the best investment you can make.
Lets say you have a 50 gallon reef and you get a 100g rated protein skimmer which it wont hurt and in the future you want to upgrade to a 80g reef you can always use the same protein skimmer without need to buy a new one..get me?...I know the protein skimmer has to match the pump as Chris S say so just work on it..........Again this is just my opinion


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## sig (Dec 13, 2010)

explor3r said:


> Im not an expert on this matter but I know that the protein skimmer is the hearth of the reef and the best investment you can make.
> Lets say you have a 50 gallon reef and you get a 100g rated protein skimmer which it wont hurt and in the future you want to upgrade to a 80g reef you can always use the same protein skimmer without need to buy a new one..get me?...I know the protein skimmer has to match the pump as Chris S say so just work on it..........Again this is just my opinion


That is what I tried to say in my broken English, but he has a problem to put a big skimmer in the sump

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## advanced reef aquatics (Apr 20, 2009)

Nightstar said:


> Some reefers maintain beautiful tanks without foam fractionation so there is no hard and fast rule regarding sizing. Additionally a well tuned undersized skimmer will remove more gunk than a poorly tuned oversized skimmer.
> 
> Tell us more about the skimmer you have and how well it skims.


id love to see some pics of a tank running without a skimmer, ive never seen a tank over 1yr old, that runs well without a skimmer.


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## sig (Dec 13, 2010)

advanced reef aquatics said:


> id love to see some pics of a tank running without a skimmer, ive never seen a tank over 1yr old, that runs well without a skimmer.


It is because you are never leaving your store 
BA on steeles had 29G with medium bioload for 4 year without skimmer and 5g water changes weekly.

It was clean with no cayno or algae

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## advanced reef aquatics (Apr 20, 2009)

your right, i do need out get out more , but ive seen alot of tanks over the years, and none did well without a skimmer, to be realistic, they dont make a good skimmer for a 29g bio cube, ive tried them all. if they did big als would have it on the tank, plus a store setting is different as there are multiple staff and hours allocated to the tanks ensuring they look their best. or so i presume.


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## Nightstar (Nov 26, 2011)

bigfishy said:


> I don't get what you mean by tuned?


By tuning I mean adjusting variables like water flow, air flow and water level in the skimmer column to achieve optimal performance. Feeding all surface water directly to the skimmer feed pump also increases efficiency.

A underrated skimmer receiving surface water vs a overrated skimmer drawing subsurface water is an interesting experiment to conduct. I expect the results would surprise many.

I employ an oversized skimmer myself so I'm not trying to talk you out of skimming. I just want to point out that a protein skimmer isn't a magic bullet and more isn't necesarily better. Excess capacity doesn't do anything but make noise and consume electricity.



advanced reef aquatics said:


> id love to see some pics of a tank running without a skimmer, ive never seen a tank over 1yr old, that runs well without a skimmer.


A quick search of the RC forums should furnish you with plenty of examples.



explor3r said:


> Im not an expert on this matter but I know that the protein skimmer is the hearth of the reef and the best investment you can make.


More kidney than heart.


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## advanced reef aquatics (Apr 20, 2009)

as stated, even searching rc im hard pressed to find such examples. the skimmer is no saviour and well said. even a 2k skimmer cannot replace good husbandry on a tank. water changes etc. a well designed sump can achieve similar results to a direct fed skimmer from display. without all the adjusting.


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## Tim (Dec 11, 2011)

sig said:


> It is because you are never leaving your store
> BA on steeles had 29G with medium bioload for 4 year without skimmer and 5g water changes weekly.
> 
> It was clean with no cayno or algae


DId they have a DSB?

I saw a few posts in the bucket DSB discussion on RC where people were getting good results. Anthony Calvo (sp?) had a store hook up their DT to a 55 gallon full of sand with just a few inches of water across the top and found their nitrates disappeared in a month or so. There are other success stories as well. I am considering trying this for fun as the skimmer I want is backordered for a month and I feel like doing something instead of twiddling my thumbs while I wait.

There is also that guy flogging his miracle mud who never used a skimmer, just had a very diverse clean up crew in a fuge with a miracle mud DSB. Of course take it for what it is worth since he was selling the stuff .


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## advanced reef aquatics (Apr 20, 2009)

dsb is subjective at best. i run my store sidplay with no dsb or fuge. zero nitrates and po4. i was the first to bring in "miracle" mud many moons ago. didnt work without a skimmer and they came out with a skimmer and suggested it at one point, dont know as of late as i havent looked into their product.


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## Chris S (Dec 19, 2007)

bigfishy said:


> Let say my protein skimmer's pump is 350gph, does that mean my return pump has to be 350gph too? or can it be higher? or lower?
> 
> What happen if I use a lower rate return pump? or vice versa?


Well, to put it simply, if you had a 100gph return pump and a 200gph skimmer (pump/rating), then you would be overskimming - meaning you are processing 200gph through the skimmer, but only half of that is "new" water, as the sump is only bringing in 100gph of water via the drain.

On the other side, if you had a 200gph return pump and a 100gph skimmer, half of the water that returns to the sump would not be processed by the skimmer, so in effect only 50% of the water is being treated by the skimmer, the rest is just being returned to the tank as is.

You can actually do some fairly complicated math that will throw what I said out the window, as of course not ALL unskimmed water goes down the drain, and not ALL skimmed water leaves the skimmer, but I will leave that for people like Martin Moe Jr. =P


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## sig (Dec 13, 2010)

Chris S said:


> Well, to put it simply, if you had a 100gph return pump and a 200gph skimmer (pump/rating), then you would be overskimming - meaning you are processing 200gph through the skimmer, but only half of that is "new" water, as the sump is only bringing in 100gph of water via the drain.
> 
> On the other side, if you had a 200gph return pump and a 100gph skimmer, half of the water that returns to the sump would not be processed by the skimmer, so in effect only 50% of the water is being treated by the skimmer, the rest is just being returned to the tank as is.
> 
> You can actually do some fairly complicated math that will throw what I said out the window, as of course not ALL unskimmed water goes down the drain, and not ALL skimmed water leaves the skimmer, but I will leave that for people like Martin Moe Jr. =P


That's easy and understandable

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## bioload (Oct 20, 2009)

poobar said:


> I am thinking of upgrading my tank and this hyperthetical question came to mind.
> 
> I have a normally stocked 50 gallon aquarium and I have a protein skimmer rated to 50 gallons. I then upgrade to a 100 gallon aquarium but don't add any new life (ie. a low stocked 100 gallon) would I need to upgrade my skimmer????


What skimmer are you using now? Is there room in the budget to include a new skimmer in the upgrade?

With all other variables remaining the same, using the same skimmer on a larger water volume would take longer to process the water in the system. This can lead to problems and frequent water changes in the future.


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## poobar (Feb 20, 2011)

I currently have the Coralife 65 gallon skimmer that's not doing a bad job (Lots of sludge) on my 35 gallon tank with a low bioload.

I was considering upgrading to a 55 gallon tank over the holidays and wondered how these are sized (Thus the question) from all I have read, I have decided to upgrade my skimmer first before I spend any money on the tank.


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## msobon (Dec 7, 2011)

poobar said:


> I currently have the Coralife 65 gallon skimmer that's not doing a bad job (Lots of sludge) on my 35 gallon tank with a low bioload.
> 
> I was considering upgrading to a 55 gallon tank over the holidays and wondered how these are sized (Thus the question) from all I have read, I have decided to upgrade my skimmer first before I spend any money on the tank.


If You're intersted ina quick cheap solution, I hve a Sedra 5000 needlewheel pump that you could adapt to the Coralife,it would require tinkering.


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## bioload (Oct 20, 2009)

poobar said:


> I currently have the Coralife 65 gallon skimmer that's not doing a bad job (Lots of sludge) on my 35 gallon tank with a low bioload.
> 
> I was considering upgrading to a 55 gallon tank over the holidays and wondered how these are sized (Thus the question) from all I have read, I have decided to upgrade my skimmer first before I spend any money on the tank.


I would recommend an upgrade if you plan on going larger


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## poobar (Feb 20, 2011)

The more I have looked into the cost for this upgrade (skimmer, lights, sump, sand, rock etc) I have decided that the best way of doing this is going to be small steps. When I have the money, I will upgrade the skimmer. Then save like mad for the rest.


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