suphew

I still disagree with you here, and we didn't find that it wasn't dependant at all. They aren't directly related, but they are related indirectly because of the required dwell time. for example if you have a huge tank and a tiny skimmer your turn over in the skimmer needs to be so high to process all the water that dwell time will end so low the efficiency will go out the window, (or you could run the correct dwell time, but then a large amount of the water would never see the skimmer). The same is less likely but could happen in the reverse, a huge skimmer on tiny tank, at some point there would be a limit to how fast you can get the water out of the tank into the skimmer so the dwell time becomes too long, wasting efficiency. If memory serves my correctly this whole thing didn't start because you stated the nutirant levels would stay the same. It started because you stated that adding a refuge would increase bioload and that this was a negative because of extra nutirants. I think you have managed to pretty soundly prove yourself wrong, because as you have proven (to me anyway) unless the skimmer hits full capicity it doesn't matter too much if you increase or decrease, volume, bioload, etc, the skimmer will continue to lower the water to the same nutirant level as dictated by how efficient it is.

Also heres an idea, rather than trying to catch the B/N have you thought about using your current tank as your B/N breeding tank and setting up the new/other tank as your display tank?

This is just the way it works, he wont leave the eggs to feed until they hatch. Once they do hatch he will eat like crazy, just make sure there is plently of food for him. If he gets too skinny and weak he will stop breeding till he puts it back on.

I hate to admit it, but thinking about this I might actally agree with you. What I'm not sure about is if a agree with how you came to the conculsion or maybe the way you put it was just too confusing. How about this, a given skimmer when running as best it can is never going to be able to remove 100% of the waste so lets say when running at optimum levels the skimmer is going to still leave 5% of the waste in the water, so excluding the transient peak (i.e. when you have just fed the fish) the water in the whole system is not going to go below 5% waste because this is the best the skimmer can do. If you then increase the total volume of water, sure you will get a short term drop in % waste in each liter but this will build back up to 5% because the skimmer is not able to get it below this.

You can let them be, they live off catching floating particals in the water.

Are they hard? Sounds like tube worms. all good.

Neither, but the water in tank 2 will be processed/skimmed twice as often as tank 1, therefore water in tank 2 will be twice as 'clean'. Okay an over simplifcation, but ignoring limiting factors, changes in efficiency etc, the statement is basically correct. But anyway the point is you listed a number of factors effecting the efficiency of a skimmer but not dwell time, then stated that water total system water volume wasn't a factor. Dwell time is a major factor, and therefore system volume is also.

No it's not right, because there is a minimum dwell time required for each different type of protein to attach to the bubble, and a minimum or ideal turn over of the total system through the skimmer, therefore if the volume of your skimmer is too low to give you the required dwell time and turn over you wont be getting 100% effiencey. As I underdstand it this is one of the main parameters (or caculations) for determining the system volume size rating of a skimmer.

You forgot to include dwell time, which does make total system volume a major factor.

Makes sense to me so far, althrough doesnt reflect reality since I don't believe there is any such thing as 100% efficient skimming. But for the sake of making this easier to understand I'll go with it so far.

No need to feed it, they are scavengers will eat left over food, they are also nocturnal (actaully will tend to hang round under over hangs waiting for fish to clean during the day) but after a while you will start to it come racing out during feeding time.

My 9kg calc reactor CO2 bottle lasts around 3-4 months at a bubble rate of about 1 per second.

I found a cure for MTS, it's a marine tank, makes you too poor to have more than one tank!

Seems to depend alot on the item, streams for example seem to go for a little more than 50% of the new price. Whereas the going rate for eheim 1060's seems to be round the $100-$120 mark, and they are 3-4 times that new.

Need to know tank size, filter type/size. the PH should be ok, it's at an acceptable level, and really its changes in PH that cause problems no so much the level. Have you done the other usual water tests? amonia, no2, no3?? Is it just one tank that is a problem or all your tanks? could be your water supply is the problem. Something in the tank leaching like wood that had garden spray on it.

I have a couple of closed loops using 32mm plumbing and 1060 pumps (around 2500lph I think) I had to add 15mm fittings to the closed loop outlets so that I actaully got any force behind the water comming out.

I had one when I was a kid, he got to about 2 feet before I decided his 4 foot tank was to small, so I just put him back in the stream he came from.

I never used it in all the years I have kept fish. I don't really believe it even contains bacteria. If it did, or even if it was just bacteria food or something, because the containers aren't sealed every bacteria (good and bad) would soon be living in it, why would you want to add to your tank??

If anything I would say you might be feeding too much, do a water test in a few days and make sure your nitrite and nitrate levels aren't getting to high.

That range is HUGE and the level should be closer to 6.4. Do like that reactor through, feel like make a couple more??? lol just joking, upgraded mine to a korallin yesterday.

I gave up on vodka, was double dosing for months and it made no difference to my cyno problem. Since cyno is a bacteria wouldn't the vodka just feed it as well???

As an "applied scientist" you should know that making up a graph yourself to support your own thoery and then trying to use it as proof is a waste of time, I could draw a graph to showing the world is flat but it doesn't make it true.

Depends what you want to keep alive in your sump, bristle stars will eat anything larger they can catch, snails, sick fish, etc, but don't think it would make a dent in your pod etc population, they are just too small and fast moving.

You would have to be able to control the temp as well which would mean a thermostat and temp probe. Towel rails are only 58w watts (just looked at the sticker on mine), but you would be heating the whole cubboard as well as the tank instead of just the tank so it will cost you more in power. Remember it takes X amount of energy to heat the tank it doesn't matter if you use a 100w heater or a 1000w heater it still takes the same energy to heat the same thing, by increasing what you are heating (by adding the room as well) you will increase the amount of energy you use.

I understand what you are saying but my point is if the skimmer has the capacity to remove the waste it will do so, it doesn't matter if the concentration changes, it's only when you reach the point that the skimmer doesn't have the capacity to remove the waste that it will build up. Skimmers don't only remove waste at certain concentrations, sure the efficiency of the skimmer might change but as long as the capacity is there to do the job it will do it.