Reef Octo LX1000s HOB Arrival + Unboxing + Performance

[crank2211]

Just received my new Reef Octopus LX1000s HOB skimmer.. I thought I had a good idea what to expect based off the few teaser photos online. I was surprised when I opened it.. It's MASSIVE and it is RED.. I'm still a bit in shock and not sure what to really think yet..

I'll be documenting as I go along..

Here's some shots of packaging..

I'll bust out a tape measure and take some pictures to give a sense of scale.. These pics really don't do the size of thing justice yet..

At this point, the word "Overkill" is going through my mind, at least for my 55...

[-RYknow]

You seriously didn't post a pic of it out of the box?!

PICS!!! MORE PICS!!!!

-RYknow

[harper]

Looking good, waiting for more pics

[crank2211]

Originally Posted by -RYknow

You seriously didn't post a pic of it out of the box?!

PICS!!! MORE PICS!!!!

-RYknow

Haha just a couple teaser pics while I grabbed some dinner.. Here come the rest..

Stand by..

[crank2211]

Some Pics...

[crank2211]

Some More..

[crank2211]

Last Set Here...





Sorry for the crude dimension drawing, I'm not an engineer

[crank2211]

What's nice is there is an adjustable gate on the intake portion of the in-tank box adjusted with a nylon screw in order to skim the surface of the water. Additionally the skimmer cup is adjustable by tightening down a nylon screw on the front of the skimmer.

[-RYknow]

Awesome!! Thanks for the pics with all the dimensions! That is one sexy looking skimmer! I can't wait to see it up and running!

Would you be able to give the dimensions of the collection cup as well? Also, is the pump removable for cleaning?

-RYknow

[skimmy]

im sure it rocks, but GOD that thing is fugly...
I'd be grabbing the can of black krylon paint for the in-tank portion...lol
it's suppose to get what, 450lph of air???
that's alot of fugly for 450lph.

on the flip side the actual design looks real solid, and it looks like it will kick some butt...

[Falcao]

great pics tagging along to see what this baby can produce.

[-RYknow]

Originally Posted by skimmy

im sure it rocks, but GOD that thing is fugly...
I'd be grabbing the can of black krylon paint for the in-tank portion...lol
it's suppose to get what, 450lph of air???
that's alot of fugly for 450lph.

on the flip side the actual design looks real solid, and it looks like it will kick some butt...

heh...I personally like the red! haha. The design does look awesome though! Really interested to see how she does.

-RYknow

[steevareno2002]

Looks like no room for a heater or carbon?

[crank2211]

Originally Posted by -RYknow

Awesome!! Thanks for the pics with all the dimensions! That is one sexy looking skimmer! I can't wait to see it up and running!

Would you be able to give the dimensions of the collection cup as well? Also, is the pump removable for cleaning?

-RYknow

Ryknow, the collection cup dimension are 6" x 3.5" x 5.25". The pump does look to be removable. I was able to remove the intake tube running into the pump easily. Just a female threaded coupler onto the intake. The other part running through the acrylic looks to be more of a pain. I would imagine you would have to unscrew the 4 screws holding the clear housing onto the pump body, dropping it to the bottom of the box. Then unscrew the clear housing and finally pull the pump. There's very little room to work with in there, so putting it back together would probably be pretty interesting.

Edit: Riser Tube ID: ~2.1"

[crank2211]

Originally Posted by skimmy

im sure it rocks, but GOD that thing is fugly...
I'd be grabbing the can of black krylon paint for the in-tank portion...lol
it's suppose to get what, 450lph of air???
that's alot of fugly for 450lph.

on the flip side the actual design looks real solid, and it looks like it will kick some butt...

Some Krylon paint might be in this skimmers future, I'm going to give it a chance to grow on me, or grow some coralline Surprisingly though, the amount of exposed red acrylic inside the tank isn't too too bad. I'm okay with the red acrylic, black or the smoked/semi-see-through black would have been much better IMO. Also, I could see myslef ruining an okay red acrylic with a crap coat of paint..

[crank2211]

Originally Posted by steevareno2002

Looks like no room for a heater or carbon?

eh, not really a heater.. Maybe small a very small one in the back pump chamber... Carbon on the other hand would probably work. I didn't realize this at first, but there's actually built in baffle to reduce bubbles before the water travels to the blue sponge. You might be able to throw some carbon in that first bubble trap chamber. It's beefy enough. Possibly could even replace the blue sponge with carbon if you wanted to. I'm running it on a reactor under the stand at the moment, so I'll just leave the sponge for now. Another contrasty clash of color in the tank haha

Here's a pic detailing the flow of water out of the skimmer.. It's hard to tell exactly how it works with clear acrylic, a flash, and clear seams..

[steevareno2002]

Thanks for that! So how's it running so far?

[crank2211]

Originally Posted by steevareno2002

Thanks for that! So how's it running so far?

So far so good.




The pumps a bit louder than I would like. A dull hum, that I'm hoping goes away after a couple days. Otherwise something might need to be tightened up. I can see very tiny high frequency ripples on top of the water in the pump chamber..

Another thing I realized is that if you have a wide fixture on your tank i.e. A fixture that runs almost fully front to back on legs, that this thing probably won't work out well. it sits pretty high off the top of the tank and shoots out over top of the water line kind of far as well. This means a low wide fixture is going to be shoved towards the front of the tank and might not work.

It barely works in my scenario since my tank is 13" wide and my fixture 8.25" wide. The skimmer forces the light fixture to the front of the tank. I would say that's the bare minimum amount of space you need for this to work (6" behind the tank and at least 4.75" of free lateral space on top of the tank after your fixture is accounted for) Hopes this makes sense

[stanlalee]

looks nice but what where they thinking with the red. Its bad enough to have to have a portion of the skimmer in the tank but does anybody seriously want look at me red for the portion visable in the display? that alone would rule it out for me or reserve it for hang on sump duty.

[-RYknow]

I know your obviously just in the break in stage, but how are the micro bubbles? Are they much of an issue? I really like the way the return is setup, with the baffle before getting to the "bubble trap". Looks like a very well thought out skimmer!

-RYknow

[crank2211]

Originally Posted by -RYknow

I know your obviously just in the break in stage, but how are the micro bubbles? Are they much of an issue? I really like the way the return is setup, with the baffle before getting to the "bubble trap". Looks like a very well thought out skimmer!

-RYknow

I can say honestly, from the first moment it was setup, there is 0 microbubbles making it back into the tank. Both the in-tank and outside box is well thought out. You can see from the picture of it in operation I posted earlier, 99% of the bubbles created by the pump/needle wheel/bubble plate remain in the reactor portion of the box above the return baffle, never even making it over the tank wall. There's only maybe a 3/4-1" opening at the bottom for the the water to travel through up and over towards the tank. What few bubbles might make it over, or created by the small splash from falling out of the skimmer into the water will get caught with either the baffle/bubble trap or the blue sponge. Definitely very impressive in that regard.

[crank2211]

Well, I realized I didn't really post a pic detailing the small space available for the stirred up water to go under then overflow back into the tank. It's pretty hard for the bubbles to escape.





And like I said, whatever does make it under, inevitably get's caught by the trap or sponge.

[ochriso]

nice
can you take a picture from the front so we can see how the red looks in the tank

[harper]

Hows it breaking in? Banging out some good nog yet?

[-RYknow]

I'm extremely interested in this skimmer for our 90. I'm still toying with the idea of just putting a sump in, but even with the sump, I might still run one of these beasts.

Really looking forward to some skimmate pics!

-RYknow