Colorado Reefs
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Seaclone 50 & 100 Skimmer Mod: Air stone implant
SeaClone 100
In an effort to boost the production of skimmate with the seaclone series of skimmers, I followed and posted up the following article(suggested mods for the seclone skimmer). Since then, I had read about the benefits and possible problems with adding an air stone to the Seaclone 50 or 100, in order to help with fractioning(the making of the bubbles). I went ahead and modified the one on my show tank to see what the outcome would be. This mod is rather simple to do, requires following:
- Air pump
- Air hose
- Lime Stone for bubble generation
- Drill
- Drill bit the size of the air hose
All you need to do is simply drill a hole in the collection cup cover, feed the air tube through, attach the limestone, and feed it down to the bottom of the riser tube. Easy enough. Hook up the air pump, and plug it in. This worked GREAT. I had great dark skimmate, and had to clean the cup the next day. What I didn’t realize(or check for) was that the salinity of the water was slowly but surely dropping from 1.025 to 1.020 SG. I’ve just noticed this the other day, and will now revert to the original set up, and try again, seeing if the same thing persists. If not, it was another culprit(maybe some bad replacement water). More to come on this front, though the skimmate produced was pretty damn good.
Tags: Air Hose, Air Stone, Air Tube, Airstone, Bubbles, Culprit, Drill Bit, Drill Drill, Hook Up, Lime Stone, Limestone, Riser Tube, Salinity, Seaclone, Seaclone 100, Seaclone 150, Seaclone Skimmer, show tank, Skimmer, Skimmers
Suggested Modifications for the Seaclone Skimmer
SeaClone 100
Given my cheap budget(in relative terms), I’ve stayed with the skimmer that came with my 75G Show tank, since I got it. Main reason, it didn’t cost anything, and has worked, very well actually. I originally got my 75G Show tank from a friend who works in the aquarium business, and had a customer who wanted his out. I took it, with the low low cost of moving it out of his house. Not a bad price, given I’d have to do that w/ a used tank anyways.
I should preface this page with first, by saying that there is a little bit different setup to my skimmer: It’s not setup HOB(Hang on Back) style. I’ve taken off the necesary pieces, and connected the Maxi-Jet 1200 directly to the skimmer body. While this reduces the bubble’s contact time with the water, it hasn’t seemed to make any difference in the performance of the skimmer. The skimmer sits in the bottom of my sump, in about 4″ of water. I should also mention, this is the SeaClone 100, not the Seaclone 150. Here we go:
- Pump/Impeller: If you’re not using a Maxi-Jet 1200 with this unit, get one. Take out the impeller and drill three tiny holes(1/16″) in each blade of the impeller. Even better, make a mesh wheel for the maxi-jet 1200. I haven’t done this, but I would expect it would help even more with performance, by making the bubbles even tinier, creating more surface area.
- Inner riser tube: I cut mine down by 3 1/2″ – 4″. There have been other pages which say you can pull this out, after taking out the inner column, but I have never been able to get either of mine out(I have 2 of these skimmers). I have a dremel with the flex shaft attachment, which made cutting this pretty easy using a smaller size cutting wheel. Given my big hands, I did putz around with it a bit, but with a little patience I got this done pretty easily. Take your time here, as breaking this would render the whole skimmer pretty much useless.
- Collection cup riser tube: Reduce the height of the riser tube in the collection cup by about 1/2″. Given the total height the foam has to go to get into the collection cup, this can only help, as it allows it to flow over into the collection cup easier.
- Replace the provided “air adjustment” valve with a real air adjustment valve. The one provided with the Maxi-Jet just doesn’t have enough control over the amount of air you want going into the skimmer.
These are the four changes I have made to the two of my SeaClone skimmers, and it has made all the difference. On average I’d say both pull out about 1 Cup per week from my Show tank cluster and my frag cluster of tanks.
Tags: Aquarium, Big Hands, Blade, Bubbles, Coral Tank, Dremel, Flex Shaft, Hob, Little Bit, Patience, Preface, Reef System, Reef Tank, Relative Terms, Riser Tube, Saltwater, Saltwater Aquarium, Seaclone 100, Seaclone 150, Seaclone Skimmer, show tank, Skimmers, Surface Area, Tiny Holes, Wh, Wheel
BioCube 14 Plumbed into 75G Show tank
Recently I got tired of topping off water on the only reef system in my house that didn’t have an auto top off system set up. That would be the nice little BioCube 14, which has remained mainly stock, with the exception of upgrading flow, and creating a fuge in the 2nd rear chamber. My requirements for the plumbing of the tank, were mainly to share the great water qualities of the 75G, as well as benefit from the 75G’s auto top off, reduceing my weekly workload even further.
To the right is a nice little google sketchup drawing showing the estimated heights of where I wanted the bulkheads to be added. Originally I planned on 1/2″ bulkheads, and during the build out, upgraded them to 3/4″ bulkeads. As you can see in the picture, the bulkhead in the second chamber is lower than the bulkhead in the third. I set the one in the third higher, incase the flow was too strong, and needed directing, as well as to mitigate any issue of backflow if either of the pumps were shutoff. what also is not pictured is that the bulkhead in the third chamber, is positions way left of center, due to the outlet into the display of the tank, I wanted to keep from having any restrictions of flow, etc.
Unfortunately this is the only picture I have, as I did this mod on the fly, with about 1/4 of the water still in the tank’s display. To keep glass dust from getting into the back chambers, I cut pads, and wrapped them with filter floss to give a nice tight fit in the back chambers while I dremeled. When working with this glass, it’s imperative that you go very slowly, and keep vibrations and heat down to a minimum. Cutting the holes for the bulkheads to size took about 1 1/2 hours total. Better to be safe than sorry. After the bulkheads were cut and everything fit, I bolted the bulkheads down, inlets on the inside.
Fitting the bulkheads after that was simply a matter of figuring out how flow would be entering and exiting. I decided on 1/4″ water tubing for the water into the BioCube via the third chamber bulkhead, and 3/8″ water tubing for the water return to the sump of my 75G. My decision on this was solely based on the fact that I already had 1/4″ tubing run for the calcium reactor, and it was quite simple to throw a T in place and a ball valve after.
My 75G has a Blueline Aqua 20 as the return pump, which feeds to the tank, the calcium reactor, and now the 14G Biocube. At the current rates, this rotates out the water volume 320 times every 24 hours, as well as always keeping the level correct in the 14G as well, and saving me time running up and down the stairs with a gallon bucket every day(Colorado is a very dry climate). The drain from the Biocube returns back to the Refugium, so corals, water quality and all benefit immeditately from skimmer, calc reactor, etc.
Tags: Auto Top, Backflow, Biocube, BioCube Mods, Bulkhead, Bulkheads, Chambers, Floss, Fuge, Google, Google Sketchup, Holes, Inlets, Plumbing, Pumps, Reef System, show tank, Tight Fit, Vibrations, Water Qualities, Water Tubing, Workload
Milwaukee SMS-122 pH controller addition
Recently I updated my 75 Gallon Show tank with a calcium reactor from craigslist. While cheap, it didn’t come with all of the necesary items, including a solenoid, and a pH controller. The calcium reactor supplies the tank with much needed calcium and alkalinity by dissolving clacium reactor media at a lower pH level(usually between 6.5 and 6.7, depending on the media).
Lowering the pH is done by injecting carbon dioxide(CO2). In order to keep the pH steady and at a low level, a bubble counter is usually used to monitor the rate at which CO2 enters the calcium reactor, and then monitored with pH test kits. Adding a pH controller and a (normally-off)CO2 solenoid to this, simplifies the prodcedure by controlling when the CO2 is allowed to enter the calcium reactor, determined by the pH of the water coming out of the calcium reactor(effluent). This is done via pH probe sitting in an effluent cup. I made mine out of a office style vertical pen holder, cutting holes with a dremel to allow for an effluent line to come in, and a drain out the bottom, allowing a pool of effluent water to be monitored by the pH probe from the Milwaukee SMS-122.
With the pH probe gathering the pH of the effluent water, the Milkwaukee SMS-122 pH controller monitors the pH, and when it rises above the set point, flips on the AC outlet pod attached to it. This is where the CO2 solenoid comes in. The operation of the solenoid is pretty simple. When power is applied to the AC plug, open the valve, when power isn’t supplied, close the valve. Easy enough. The solenoid is put in place between the needle valve connected to the CO2 pressure regulator(on the tank) and the bubble counter(which then goes to the reactor), allowing the flow to be set by the needle valve, and indicated by the bubble counter, when the solenoid is powered ON, and the solenoid valve is open. At this point, assuming the pH controller is already calibrated(mine came calibrated already, but I double checked it with the included fluids), and the set point set to what you would like, the pH will be held close to steady to wherever the set point is(in the case of a ca reactor, 6.5-6.7ish).
Having this setup, now the only thing to determine with the reactor is the flow rate of the effluent from the reactor, as well as to watch the pH of the tank, so that the lower pH water coming from the reactor doesn’t drop the pH of the tank too much, while increasing your calcium and alkalinity.
Tags: Ac Outlet, Ac Plug, alkalinity, calcium reactor, Carbon Dioxide, Co2 Pressure Regulator, Co2 Reactor, Co2 Regulator, Craigslist, Dremel, Effluent Water, Milwaukee Sms 122, Needle Valve, Pen Holder, pH controller, Ph Level, Ph Probe, Ph Test, Reef Tank, Saltater Tank, Saltwater, show tank, solenoid, Solenoid Valve, Test Kits
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