andy Posted January 8, 2007 Share Posted January 8, 2007 Well, my DIY skimmer has been up and running for a while now so I guess it's safe to post about it (scary) Video of it in action here. Construction: Carefully drilling holes for the Uni-seals in the 6" extruded acrylic tube. Cast acrylic is said to be much better than extruded, but is more expensive. I did run into a small-ish problem that I might not have if I had sprung for cast, but overall I'm satisfied. Holes drilled. Upper hole for the input, lower two for the needlewheel recirculating pump drain and return. Drain hole off to the side. Uni-seals installed. Gluing the tube to the base. And what do we glue acrylic with? ;-) Coming together... The drain pipe with ball joint. The template I made for the top, and the final product. The pointy end will get drilled for the output pipe vent tube. I 'borrowed' the neck and collection tube off of my Berlin skimmer. I plan on making a replacement once the weather warms up a bit, garage is too chilly now :-( Initially, I glued the Berlin neck down with cyano-acrylate (superglue) but it didn't seal so I filleted it with epoxy putty. Off to the router/shaper table! Routed the neck, nice and even. Assembled, looking a bit goofy with it's little Berlin pin-head collection cup. I started off with only 6 nylon wingnut/bolts and no gasket. I had to double the number of bolts and cut a custom gasket to fit, bloody leaks. Here's the maybe-extruded-acrylic-problem I had. When pushing the PVC through the lower uni-seal, the bottom cracked. I wanted to cry. Nothing a bit of epoxy putty couldn't fix, though. All assembled, with the PCI 2400 needlewheel pump connected. The gee-gaw on the pump is an acrylic bracket I had to build to hold the pump together after I broke the tabs off the cheap plastic impeller shroud. The gee-gaw later broke, acrylic doesn't resist the stress of flexing particularly well. Installed and running, with a fancy new OceanRunner 2700 Needlewheel pump replacing the annoying PCI pump. Dry skimming on the very first night First skimmate -- dark and surprisingly not-nasty-smelling. Tastes great, less filling! Next up? MESHWHEEL!! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
inkto Posted January 8, 2007 Share Posted January 8, 2007 There has to be a little adventure in any DIY or it wouldn't be DIY, right? The funny thing about the extruded vs. cast debate is that both my Korallin reactor and my AquaC skimmer are made with extruded and I don't recall any major issues with product reliability over the years. Cast is undoubtedly a better material in many regards and a mass-produced product favoring the cheaper of the two offers no surprise... but I say if you can work the cheaper material (even with a little crying ) why not use it in low pressure situations like this? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
oldbrownies Posted January 9, 2007 Share Posted January 9, 2007 how tall did you make the skimmer chamber? I am planning on doing something similar, but i can't decide how tall. oh and where did you get 6" extruded? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
andy Posted January 9, 2007 Author Share Posted January 9, 2007 18" tall. I got it at TAP Plastics on Sandy in Portland. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
mister crabs Posted January 10, 2007 Share Posted January 10, 2007 how do you think your skimmer compares to a good quality skimmer like an octopus or something? I may go the DIY route if it saves me some coin. how much you think total to build this thing? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
andy Posted January 10, 2007 Author Share Posted January 10, 2007 Hard to do a direct comparison, I don't have one to compare to. I'd put it up against the competition though :-) I probably spent about $200 on it, including $90 for the needlewheel pump. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
oldbrownies Posted January 12, 2007 Share Posted January 12, 2007 Sweet, I just orderd acrylic for my new skimmers, calcium reactors and kalk reactors, 2 of each! I'm insane I know Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
oldbrownies Posted January 12, 2007 Share Posted January 12, 2007 btw, how are the uni-seals working out for you? I see that the one around the output pipe looks like its covered in epoxy Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
andy Posted January 12, 2007 Author Share Posted January 12, 2007 The uni-seals work great just be careful installing the PVC pipe through them. I didn't wet it enough and pressed too hard -- cracked the acrylic, fixed with epoxy :-( Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
oldbrownies Posted January 13, 2007 Share Posted January 13, 2007 oh okay, I saw that you cracked it, I just didn't realize that you cracked it that bad Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
andy Posted January 13, 2007 Author Share Posted January 13, 2007 Cracked from the drain hole to the edge, about 1.5" Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
andy Posted March 19, 2007 Author Share Posted March 19, 2007 Skimmer v1.5 I got sick of that nasty Berlin neck and cup, so I took a stab at heat-forming my own tapered neck. I think it turned out okay for a first try: The riser is too tall, I'll have to shorten it an inch or so. This skimmer itself has a few fundamental design and build flaws, I think it's time to start from scratch on v2.0 (whistle) Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
andy Posted May 18, 2007 Author Share Posted May 18, 2007 Update on the extruded vs. cast acrylic discussion. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
wanareef Posted August 1, 2007 Share Posted August 1, 2007 I started off with only 6 nylon wingnut/bolts and no gasket. I had to double the number of bolts and cut a custom gasket to fit, bloody leaks. Just an idea - you can use an "O" ring for a better seal. Just rout a small "ledge" for the "O" ring then put the top on and it's sealed. I'll try and post a pix as that will be eaiser to understand. Another idea, to use 3/8" material for the bottom of the flange, then you can just "tap" threads for thumb screws. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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