Octopus Skimmer Mods

[ChemE]

I just checked on my NW-200 again and it is pretty much shut down. I've got the riser pipe set so that the fluid level is at the bottom of the neck and there is virtually no foam in the neck. I'll keep an eye on it across the next few days as evaporation drops the level in the sump to see when it kicks back in.

[Roland Jacques]

Originally posted by ChemE
OK, for those of you not keeping up with the Bum Kicking Thread...

During a water change tonight I pulled enough water out to drop the level in the sump about 4". My NW-200 is still plugged in to my Kill-A-Watt from the posts on Pf. The power consumption went from 65 watts to 61 watts when the water level went down (this implies more air being drawn at 61 watts). I then added more fresh salt water than I took out to see if the opposite effect would be observed and sure enough the power consumption went back up to 67 watts once the level in the sump was higher than I had started. There is clearly less air in the neck of the skimmer at this increased depth.

Those of you with Dwyer meters should spend a little time taking air draw measurements as a function of immersion depth and post back the results. Clearly there is an optimal depth that these should be run at.

I found that air flow at lower sump levels 5"and 6" air intake was around 15% less than at 10" ( that was when the skimmer had the orginal impeller...)

[Fliger]

Hey all - I don't know if this has already been covered but I got a PM from a pretty well respected RC member today that had this to say after testing a couple pumps

"getting 10 l/min air with my genx6000 i am getting about 16-17 l/min [with 1260]"

Dunno if that actually too much air but thats a pretty high LPH. Reefer714's amazing DIY job also has the H&S 1260's pulling well over 15LPM. I guess $299 isn't exactly cheap but at least you know its gonna work.

Again, sorry if this has already been covered - just thought I'd pass it on ....

[JoeESSA]

Anyone tried using a power head with venturi as feed pump for a recirculating skimmer?

Last night when I changed my Rio 600 out for a mj1200 as feed to my rps-2000 I thought about connecting the air line to the mj1200, but abandoned the attempt when I realized that I would need an adapter to the water feed hose to the skimmer.

Occured to me that I could regulate water feed flow rate to the skimmer by adjusting the venturi to the mj1200 and at the same time introduce more air.

Am I a genius or has this been tried and thrown out before?

[RichConley]

why spend $300 for a 1260 to pull 17lpm when we can get a $49 pump to do the same?

Especially when its way too much for the neck of this thing. 25-30scfh is absolute max, IMO.

[Fliger]

Wow, I didn't know there was a +1,000LPH pump for $49. Must be a DIY dream. Which is it?

[clkwrk]

I am still waiting to see a line of people who have sucessfully done this gutter wheel mod and have the same results.

[Deuce67]

I tried the gutter mod last night on my OTP 2000. Didnt work. Ill try again this weekend with fewer gutter gaurds.

[Robert Patterso]

Well I received my air guage today, 5-50 scfh. It's a cheaper model from Dwyer but if at all accurate I'm a little disappointed. I read only about 12-14 scfh. That's with all modds except RHgg nw mod. Haven't gotten around to that due to a broken wrist. Pretty hard to hang on to something with a cast on.

My skimmer came with only the long style venturi. Does anybody know if the short venturi performs better? If so where can I get one. Received my 200nw from Marine solutions, I did talk to them about it and he said he wasn't aware of any performance differences. If anything if someone could give me deminsions of shorter one I could have one machined at the shop I work in. OD,ID and overall length. If anybody has any info. on this it would be appreciated.

Thanks, Robert

[RichConley]

Originally posted by Fliger
Wow, I didn't know there was a +1,000LPH pump for $49. Must be a DIY dream. Which is it?

I've seen it on Genx pumps, I've seen it on the octopus pumps, I've seen it on ORs, its all about the threadwheel style impellar.


Robert Patterson, have you made your venturi more restrictive yet? Have you used larger airline (or more airline taps in the venturi?).


Robert, I've only used the short venturi, but I believe roland got better performance out of it than the long one.

[RichConley]

Originally posted by clkwrk
I am still waiting to see a line of people who have sucessfully done this gutter wheel mod and have the same results.

They've gone over to this thread:

http://www.reefcentral.com/forums/sh...5&pagenumber=1

and theres plenty of them. We're getting 20lpm out of a genx4100 in some cases, and I still think we can pull more.


You basically cannot cavitate these things. ATI was definitely onto something here.

[clkwrk]

Are you crazy ? I don't call you, Roland and kentrob11 a line of sucessuful people .

Besides not one single person has reported back that it worked on their OTP pumps

BTW the only 2 pumps besides the ones you and Roland have worked on were the genx 4100 and 1500.

[RichConley]

Clwrk, most of the people are complaining that their pump wont start up. In most cases, thats becaues they've got too much gutterguard on theirs. It didnt work on the maxijet 1200 I did it on at first.


Then I realized it was binding up on the housing. Now it works, and went from pulling about 3scfh, to over 10.

I'm starting to think you just like arguing with me.

[Roland Jacques]

Robert,
The 2 venturis are pretty close in performance IMO. I do like the short one better. I did some modifications to it also. I don’t think it is necessary to get over 20 scfh with the NW-200. So getting any more air now does not mean much.

I ordered you NW impeller. Ill mod it, test it, and get it to you as soon as I can.

Where you’re at now. I was getting 16- scfh, before I did the venturi work. So you’re not far off. Just wait to you get the GG wheel impeller. That alone may put you into the19s or low 20s. we just have to see.

[clkwrk]

No but I want to see it work for more people . You go around on your tall horse bragging about this and saying many people have done it yet I see no one coming back to post it works . I have seen them say it didn't work.


Here is one for you . Take the old maxi jet mod where you cut the nozzle off so that it shoots current out in different dirrections upon start up to give more random flow.

No that mod can be repeated by everyone on a MJ and it will work ......Proven to work time and time again .

When this gutterwheel mod is as sucessful I will give you a thumbs up. But as of now there is no consitancy in this mod to give any bragging rights about how great it is . Its junk if its not replicated on a steady basis.

[RichConley]

Jesus christ Cwlrk. This is like any other DIY mod. If you dont do it correctly, it wont work.


I've seen dozens of maxistream mods where people put them together incorrectly, and they dont work. Are you saying theyre a failure as a DIY? Because I sure as hell dont think so.

I've seen plenty of failed DIY calcium reactors. Does that mean DIY calcium reactors are junk? No.

You can't assume that something is crap because people put them together wrong.


As to having it be repeatable, etc. I've done it on a maxijet, an OTP3000, an OR2700, and a Resun King 590 needlwheel pump, and seen significant improvement in each. The reason most of the success stories are between the three of us is because we're the majority of the people trying this.

Again, I've only seen two succesful TinyMight needlewheel pumps. Does that mean theyre crap? No. It just means that some people aren't doing it right.

[Robert Patterso]

Originally posted by RichConley
I've seen it on Genx pumps, I've seen it on the octopus pumps, I've seen it on ORs, its all about the threadwheel style impellar.


Robert Patterson, have you made your venturi more restrictive yet? Have you used larger airline (or more airline taps in the venturi?).


Robert, I've only used the short venturi, but I believe roland got better performance out of it than the long one.

Rich what I've done is put two air lines in, both are next each other approx. 5deg angle. I have'nt done anything to restrict water flow at input of pump, if that is what you are talking about, but with the second air line and both pulling air, if I plug one of the lines the water level will rise about 1"-11/2" ins. That tell me its pulling more air. Correct me if I'm wrong. What did do also but removed it, was glue a piece of rigid air line tube to the end of the intake of pump which slowed gph quite a bit. I'm shooting in dark here cause I don't have gph gauge. I removed it to see if it changed air intake, no noticable diff.. To me it seems awful turbilent in skimmer and top of bubbles in skimmer is like club soda fizzing in there. It's been running for 4 days and not one ounce of skimmate. I don't doubt the skimmer is a good one, I've seen pics on here. I need this thing to start making some skum, I got a tank with about 12 or so acro. frags ect.

[clkwrk]

This has nothing to do with Spazz's mods with the tiny might so leave him out of this! He is not going around boasting like you .

Also I am talking about the simple cut the nizzel off maxi jet mod ........It is just as simple to ziptie some guttergard onto a NW.

Putting gutterguard on a NW isn't technical Unlike the MJ stream mod thats has alot more involved.

[Robert Patterso]

Originally posted by Roland Jacques
Robert,
The 2 venturis are pretty close in performance IMO. I do like the short one better. I did some modifications to it also. I don’t think it is necessary to get over 20 scfh with the NW-200. So getting any more air now does not mean much.

I ordered you NW impeller. Ill mod it, test it, and get it to you as soon as I can.

Where you’re at now. I was getting 16- scfh, before I did the venturi work. So you’re not far off. Just wait to you get the GG wheel impeller. That alone may put you into the19s or low 20s. we just have to see.

Thanks Roland, I'm trying to be patient, this thing is about to drive me crazy. ( pretty short trip for me )

[RichConley]

Originally posted by clkwrk
This has nothing to do with Spazz's mods with the tiny might so leave him out of this! He is not going around boasting like you .

Also I am talking about the simple cut the nizzel off maxi jet mod ........It is just as simple to ziptie some guttergard onto a NW.

Putting gutterguard on a NW isn't technical Unlike the MJ stream mod thats has alot more involved.

No, its not as simple CLKWRK, because your have to pay attention to certain things. If the zipties are in the wrong place, it binds up the pump. If you put too much gutterguard on, the impellar is too heavy, and it wont spin. If the gutterguard isnt the right diameter, it grinds on the housing.


I'm not boasting. I'm responding to your repeated, unfounded, accusations that Roland and I are lying to you people. Why the hell would I lie about this? Its his mod, not mine

[RichConley]

Originally posted by Robert Patterso
if I plug one of the lines the water level will rise about 1"-11/2" ins. That tell me its pulling more air. Correct me if I'm wrong. What did do also but removed it, was glue a piece of rigid air line tube to the end of the intake of pump which slowed gph quite a bit. I'm shooting in dark here cause I don't have gph gauge

If blocking one of the airlines cuases the water level to rise, yeah, you're moving more air with both of them open.

I'm not sure what you're doing with the rigid tube. If you want to restrict the venturi to get a higher air/water ratio, you need to make the air intake be between the restriction and the pump. It sounds to me like the restriction is between the air and the pump.

[clkwrk]

Whatever! I just wanna see results and so far it very very limited.......

Also I think you seem to have forgotten I own an RPS3000 . So if this can work for many others using the same pump and or skimmer then I may jump on this lil bandwagon until then I value my 1 year manuf warranty .

So with that said lets hear from some other people who have done this mod.

[RichConley]

Originally posted by clkwrk

So with that said lets hear from some other people who have done this mod.

Thats the whole problem right there.

People like you with their "warrantys"

I think its really just a couple of us hacking the crap out of these things. Everyone else is sitting around waiting. THats the problem. Your'e not going to hear from many people, because not many people are willing to try.

[Robert Patterso]

Originally posted by RichConley
If blocking one of the airlines cuases the water level to rise, yeah, you're moving more air with both of them open.

I'm not sure what you're doing with the rigid tube. If you want to restrict the venturi to get a higher air/water ratio, you need to make the air intake be between the restriction and the pump. It sounds to me like the restriction is between the air and the pump.

At the very end of venturi which would put air between restriction and pump, restriction, air, pump. With the tube glued on end of intake furthest out to water, the water level in skimmer would drop by a couple of inches easily. I may glue it back on. Have a small sump, quite the drag to get to. Like I said though, with or without seemed to make no diff. in air. You think I should restrict water?

[JoeESSA]

Take it no one though much of my suggestion above???