kien's 150g Room Divider Mixed Reef & Stuff

[Delphinus]

Haha, I totally did the opposite with my bubble magus skimmer. I took off the drain line and capped the hole. The reason being is that, while this is a great idea and is good for the reasons you outlined .. there is also now nothing to stop the skimmer from overflowing your sump empty should a snail or something get wedged into the skimmer's output.

Now it used to be pretty common to use a waste collector instead of a bottle on beckett skimmers but you don't see them used on needlewheel skimmers. The reason being though is that the cup is not sealed like they are on becketts (usually flanged and bolted, with a gasket) so that air can't escape except via the drain line. When the drain line closes (usually by a pingpong ball float in the waste collector) then the skimmer can't produce foam anymore because of the back pressure. This was one neat feature with beckett skimmers that seems to be lost with the current gen needlewheels.

Anyhow it's just something to watch out for.

I think what some people are doing nowadays is just putting a drain line on their collection bottles or buckets so that if the bottles overfills it just drains back to the tank. Yeah, gross to dump skimmate back in the tank but it beats an empty sump and a wet floor (it would get skimmed out again pretty quick after you fix the issue anyhow).

[kien]

Whoa! That is a very good point! Never thought about a snail ever getting into the outlet of the skimmer as the outlet is pretty darn big.

I just went to inspect my skimmer and I have a sock tied to the outlet to cut down on bubbles :-) So I think I'm safe? Anywhere else a snail could get in?

[shrimpchips]

You can also keep the bottle in your sump, so on the off chance it does overflow, it just does so back into the sump.

[mseepman]

Originally Posted by shrimpchips

You can also keep the bottle in your sump, so on the off chance it does overflow, it just does so back into the sump.

Haha...very good and obvious suggestion that never dawned on me.

[kien]

Ya, I was thinking about that as an option. Need to figure out how to weigh the bottle down so that it can sit in the sump water.. Although, I'm still having a hard time figuring out where else a snail could get into the skimmer's outlet since I have mine covered by a splash/bubble guard socky thing.

[Delphinus]

Well, snail is only one potential scenario. There may be others that I just can't dream up right now. I have no experience with your model of skimmer but the needlewheels I've played around with before, some have been worse than others for the occasional berserkness that causes them to overflow. The Bubble Magus is for some reason one of the worst this way for me, but I had a CSS65 on a 20g before that was just as bad and had I run that thing as hang-on as it was intended I would have emptied the sump several times. I don't know what the cause is whether it's something in the livestock taking a mondo poop or maybe a snail spawn or who knows, but it's something. But I had other skimmers that didn't do that (ASM) so .. yeah, who knows.

Instead of weighing down the bottle so it sits under the water level, you could just make a little eggcrate or acrylic (or glass) shelf that the bottle could sit on. The bottle needn't sit in the sump per se, it just needs to overflow into the sump.

It's sort of a balancing act though, if you have to tip your bottle sideways to maneuver it out of the sump then you might still be better off having it sit on the outside of the sump on a little shelf and just with a little hose that drains back to the sump.

[kien]

Originally Posted by Delphinus

Instead of weighing down the bottle so it sits under the water level, you could just make a little eggcrate or acrylic (or glass) shelf that the bottle could sit on.

tru dat! I guess that's why we keep you around Tony. You're full of great ideas!