anyone with seaclone skimmer?

[bprewit]

I picked up a old seaclone skimmer from aquarium maint. place for $20 and hung it on my tank. The thing worked rather crappy and would pull out a little bit of gunk one day and do nothing the next day but dump bubbles in my tank. The air adjustment sucked but I kinda also figured the short height of the skimmer didnt allow for very much reaction time and reduced its ability to work well. I have since added a sump to my tank and followed the simple mods like cutting the inner riser tube shorter and had a bit of success but still not great. So I finally broke down and made a big modification. I cut the skimmer in half, and using 3" pvc pipe and collars I added 16" to the height of the skimmer making it a total of 30" and added 2" pvc pipe to the reaction chamber tube. So now with a taller skimmer the pump wouldnt keep up so I modified a rio 1700 pump, added a base to the skimmer so it would sit in the sump, and now the skimmer works like a charm! It was work to get this done but overall it was much cheaper than buying a new $200 skimmer and the thing works great. If anyone has one of these and would like info on the mods I made I can send you pictures, parts list, and some instructions on getting it done.

[MikeP]

Sounds cool! I have an old seaclone you can have if you want another to experiment on - doubt I'll ever use it again.

[whatsareef]

I had one for about 10 days and turned around and sold it and bought a real skimmer. I am interested in seeing what you did with yours. (bprewit)

[Moonrs]

I have had good experience with my seaclone skimmer, unmodified. Once i got it adjusted, it's worked great. I have to admit it's the only one I've ever had, so I really don't have anything to compare it to. I'd appreciate the plans you made up, though, Thanks.

[Jenn]

I have also had the same experience as Moonrs, but its the only kind I have experience with too. Mine seem to work ok after adjustment
(2-3 days), but I can't figure out how to take it completely apart to clean it.
BPREWIT, I would also love to see what you did. I am slowly learning and buliding a 55 gal. sump, and will be having to modify mine as well.

[Jenn]

On my FO tank w/ the 3 meateaters, I empty it every other day. On the other tank, I emptied it out once a week.

[Moonrs]

I empty my skimmer cup once or twice a week, except when I do a water change/topoff. At those times I end up pouring it out a couple of times in one day, but then it goes back down to every few days.

[ryanrichter]

I have a seaclone also, and would love to see how you modified it. I really havent had a problem with mine. It started pumping bubbles into my tank after I tried to kill the hair algae by adding Marine SAT. So I just used some filter pad from the return to pull out the bubbles. :D

[bprewit]

Wow I actually forgot that I posted this and never added anything to it! Sorry about that! What I wanted to do was increase the reaction time between the water and bubbles so I had to increase the height of the skimmer. Also I had added a sump to my setup so I figured I would just change it to a in-sump skimmer. I used a 18" piece of 3" PVC and two 3" collars for the main body and a piece of 2" PVC and 2" collar to the inner riser tube. I cut the skimmer in half and glued the collars to each end of the pvc then glued the skimmer half's into the collars. The collars are actually too big for the skimmer body but they do fit leakproof into the ridge that sits halfway in the collars. After that I measured the actual height difference of the skimmer and cut the 2"pvc so that the inner riser tube would be the same height as it was before. The 2" collar is too small for the riser tube but with a little bit of sanding it fit together just right. Since I added this to the sump I had to have some way of keeping the water from making a 2' drop from the skimmer to the sump and making a huge splash so I used more 3"pvc to fit the skimmer output with a 3X1 reducer on the bottom, and three 1" elbows to fix the problem. This makes no sense whatsoever without a complete picture I know, and tomorrow I will try and pull the skimmer out of the sump and take a pic of the entire assembly to explain it a bit better. I run this with a mag drive 350gph pump now with airline tubing glued to the inlet of the pump to pull in the air and whip it up into tiny bubbles and also a airstone which runs through the center of the skimmer almost to the bottom. It would have been easier to buy a $200 skimmer but I always love to work on stuff to try and improve it so this is what I did. The skimmer worked in its stock form but was very inconsistent needing constant adjustment to keep it working 100%. Now all I ever do is just empty the skimmate a couple of times a week and havent made any adjustments to this since I modified it. Here is a picture of the skimmer working, dosent show any detail but does show it working atleast.

[Jenn]

Looks great! Thanks Bprewit.

[Medinafish]

Wow! I just relegated my Seacrap to the "Left over aquariom stuff bin" and forgot about it. Bought an AquaC (dark skimmate daily) and pressed on. Guys like you, with vision and expertise, are to be congratulated!! I'll now consider your "upgrade" so I'll have a back-up. Thanks.

Barry (Medinafish)

[Nano_Steve]

how about adding some airstones to the reaction chamber? wouldnt that allow for more contact with bubbles and just be a really cheap and easy mod?

(wow, kinda bringin this thread back from the dead :P)

-steve

[Richard]

Here is a link to modifying seaclone skimmers. The big problem with them is that the bubbles are not in contact with the water very long because they choose to go for the cool tornado of air bubbles sales gimmick instead of actual efficiency.

http://www.reefsuk.com/Marine%20Aquariums/Articles/Seaclone.htm

[Nano_Steve]

i suspected as much about the air stone. yeah that vortex of bubbles is neat to look at but who in this hobby really watches the skimmer??? :P

here's another great link i found!

http://reefcentral.com/diy/seaclone_modifications.htm

-steve

[dan203]

i was going to sale my suckclone today, but i may just modify it first.

[zemuron114]

crap, i just bought 2 today... wish i read this first. If anyone has EXACT instructions. that would be great to modify. Bought them off ebay so returning will be a b1tch... thanks