KENT protein skimmmer??????
- Thread starter mrrrkva
- Start date
never buy hardware from youre LFS, they usually have names no one has heard of, and they are expensive as hell, shop online,alot cheaper, there are many online vendors try these 2 www.marinedepot.com www.premiumaquatics.com go to their skimmers section and choose a model for youre setup, if you dont know call them up and they will be more than happy to help you, Jason is very helpfull at premiumaquatics, good luck and don't rush, shop wisely it's youre money, cya.
I would ask them to use it first. It has only recently been on the market and definitely not long enough to have anything close to a proven track record. Be skeptical of a claim that a $220 dollar skimmer at an LFS can handle adequately a 300 gallon aquarium. It may be an excellent skimmer but I'm betting the LFS has not used it yet.
What size system do you want to skim? and how heavy?
What size system do you want to skim? and how heavy?
Well, lookee here, we just got a bunch of dealer samples from Kent, and included was a Nautilus TE skimmer for testing. I'll find a system to put it on and we'll post a continuous review of the product. It does at a glance look like a venturi skimmer based upon Berlin or Aqua Medic components.
<blockquote><font size="1" face="Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif">quote:</font><hr>Originally posted by Rover:
<strong>How does it look?
</strong><hr></blockquote>
Not bad
It's been running for a little over 48 hours and is just starting to skim. I'll post more thoughts on it after it's had a few days to run and maybe an indepth review in a week or two.
Build quality is fine, materials are a bit cheaper grade plastic than acrylic, but are what I would expect from a skimmer that should retail for $225-250 or so plus pump. Very simple setup, you'd have to be brain dead to screw it up, took me about 60 seconds to get it up and running.
Overall first impression is: a simple design that seems to work just fine. In fact I think it's simplicity is it's greatest attribute.
stay tuned....
[ December 06, 2001: Message edited by: MickAv8r ]</p>
<strong>How does it look?
</strong><hr></blockquote>
Not bad
Build quality is fine, materials are a bit cheaper grade plastic than acrylic, but are what I would expect from a skimmer that should retail for $225-250 or so plus pump. Very simple setup, you'd have to be brain dead to screw it up, took me about 60 seconds to get it up and running.
Overall first impression is: a simple design that seems to work just fine. In fact I think it's simplicity is it's greatest attribute.
stay tuned....
[ December 06, 2001: Message edited by: MickAv8r ]</p>
I guess I can finish the full initial evaluation. Keep in mind that this thing has been running for only 5 days and "Mr. Speaker, I reserve the right to revise and extend my remarks for the record."
Overall, big thumbs up. I went into this with low expectations. Especially when I unpacked it because the construction materials used don't give you a warm and fuzzy feeling (cheaper grade plastic's all around when you compare to say a Berlin or Turboflotor) and trust me you aren't going to mistake this skimmer for an 8' tall, 4 head Beckett skimmer. This skimmer is in the class of CPR SR series, Berlins, Urchins Pro, Turboflotor's etc and for ease of use, compact size and performance it is definitely at or near the top of the pack so far.
I basically plugged it in and forgot about it. Occasionally when I walked past it I would give it a little tweak here or there. It didn't produce skimmate for about 36 hours but when it did kick in it was a bit too wet and at 48 hours the cup was half full but with a nice brown light brown liquid. I emptied the cup and tweaked it to dry the skimmate out a bit. Slowly adjusted it over the weekend and it had some nice skimmate in the cup when we closed last night.
It is being driven by a Mag 7 pump. I may eventually toss a 5 on there to see if performance suffers, but the Mag 7 seems to be the best and is the recommended Mag pump by Kent. Supposedly the 2100 and 2500 Rio's work as well. I put a Mag 9.5 on it and this worked, precariously (huge almost inevitable chance of flooding with this pump), the bubble size wasn't any smaller nor were there any more so I switched back to a Mag 7.
So yeah it isn't built like a battleship, but damn if doesn't seem to be getting the job done at a reasonable price. We have it on a 180 gallon holding system and I think it will handle this system just fine. I think for most hobbyiest's tanks it will handle 50-120 gallon systems just fine, though most people with larger tanks will likely want to upgrade to a higher performance skimmer. The true test is a long term one, with heavy feedings and whether or not it can export enough to keep problem algaes from starting. Only time will tell. For a real workout maybe I'll make it help cure the next 450 pounds of rock we get in.
I'll post some pics of the skimmer in operation tomorrow.
Overall, big thumbs up. I went into this with low expectations. Especially when I unpacked it because the construction materials used don't give you a warm and fuzzy feeling (cheaper grade plastic's all around when you compare to say a Berlin or Turboflotor) and trust me you aren't going to mistake this skimmer for an 8' tall, 4 head Beckett skimmer. This skimmer is in the class of CPR SR series, Berlins, Urchins Pro, Turboflotor's etc and for ease of use, compact size and performance it is definitely at or near the top of the pack so far.
I basically plugged it in and forgot about it. Occasionally when I walked past it I would give it a little tweak here or there. It didn't produce skimmate for about 36 hours but when it did kick in it was a bit too wet and at 48 hours the cup was half full but with a nice brown light brown liquid. I emptied the cup and tweaked it to dry the skimmate out a bit. Slowly adjusted it over the weekend and it had some nice skimmate in the cup when we closed last night.
It is being driven by a Mag 7 pump. I may eventually toss a 5 on there to see if performance suffers, but the Mag 7 seems to be the best and is the recommended Mag pump by Kent. Supposedly the 2100 and 2500 Rio's work as well. I put a Mag 9.5 on it and this worked, precariously (huge almost inevitable chance of flooding with this pump), the bubble size wasn't any smaller nor were there any more so I switched back to a Mag 7.
So yeah it isn't built like a battleship, but damn if doesn't seem to be getting the job done at a reasonable price. We have it on a 180 gallon holding system and I think it will handle this system just fine. I think for most hobbyiest's tanks it will handle 50-120 gallon systems just fine, though most people with larger tanks will likely want to upgrade to a higher performance skimmer. The true test is a long term one, with heavy feedings and whether or not it can export enough to keep problem algaes from starting. Only time will tell. For a real workout maybe I'll make it help cure the next 450 pounds of rock we get in.
I'll post some pics of the skimmer in operation tomorrow.
I want to add a couple things to Tom's eval that I think are the unique points this skimmer has to offer.
1) Although it is a venturi design, the venturi is not part of the skimmer itself. The venturi assembly is seperate and you attach it to the intake side of whatever pump you are using. This gives the advantage of having the pump's impeller chop the bubbles finer than would be possible otherwise. This is not a new idea - the Turbofloter does the same thing - but the implementation is unique since you can drive it directly from the sump like any other skimmer. You don't have to plumb it into the overflow like the Turbofloter.
2) The output is a vertical tube. The water flows up this tube and simply spills out of the open top. This is similar to what has been done with many AquaC installations where you attach an upward-pointing elbow to the output - it gives you a very stable water level in the skimmer. On the Kent, this tube telescopes up and down so you can adjust the internal water level.
3) They give you a foam tube that can be placed on the output tube in case of excess bubbles. We haven't noticed a bubble problem, but this approach gives you a lot of flexibility: you can slide the foam higher than the tube so all the water flows through it; or you can make it level with the tube end so that most water flows through, but the level won't change if it gets clogged - the water just flows over it.
Like Tom, I did not have great expectations. In fact, I think my initial response was "Great, that's all we need, another lousy skimmer." But it does seems to work so far, and the price point fits nicely above the CPR SR-2 and AquaC Urchin, but below the AquaC EV-120.
1) Although it is a venturi design, the venturi is not part of the skimmer itself. The venturi assembly is seperate and you attach it to the intake side of whatever pump you are using. This gives the advantage of having the pump's impeller chop the bubbles finer than would be possible otherwise. This is not a new idea - the Turbofloter does the same thing - but the implementation is unique since you can drive it directly from the sump like any other skimmer. You don't have to plumb it into the overflow like the Turbofloter.
2) The output is a vertical tube. The water flows up this tube and simply spills out of the open top. This is similar to what has been done with many AquaC installations where you attach an upward-pointing elbow to the output - it gives you a very stable water level in the skimmer. On the Kent, this tube telescopes up and down so you can adjust the internal water level.
3) They give you a foam tube that can be placed on the output tube in case of excess bubbles. We haven't noticed a bubble problem, but this approach gives you a lot of flexibility: you can slide the foam higher than the tube so all the water flows through it; or you can make it level with the tube end so that most water flows through, but the level won't change if it gets clogged - the water just flows over it.
Like Tom, I did not have great expectations. In fact, I think my initial response was "Great, that's all we need, another lousy skimmer." But it does seems to work so far, and the price point fits nicely above the CPR SR-2 and AquaC Urchin, but below the AquaC EV-120.
<<2) The output is a vertical tube. The water flows up this tube and simply spills out of the open top. This is similar to what has been done with many AquaC installations where you attach an upward-pointing elbow to the output - it gives you a very stable water level in the skimmer. On the Kent, this tube telescopes up and down so you can adjust the internal water level.
3) They give you a foam tube that can be placed on the output tube in case of excess bubbles. We haven't noticed a bubble problem, but this approach gives you a lot of flexibility: you can slide the foam higher than the tube so all the water flows through it; or you can make it level with the tube end so that most water flows through, but the level won't change if it gets clogged - the water just flows over it.>>
<<Sounds like a plastic Euroreef to me. Without the special impeller, of course. >>
Which is what the G-series is.. plastic euroreef type skimmer with the same type of output.. this is nothing new. I guess what it would amount to is price vs. quality of materials.
3) They give you a foam tube that can be placed on the output tube in case of excess bubbles. We haven't noticed a bubble problem, but this approach gives you a lot of flexibility: you can slide the foam higher than the tube so all the water flows through it; or you can make it level with the tube end so that most water flows through, but the level won't change if it gets clogged - the water just flows over it.>>
<<Sounds like a plastic Euroreef to me. Without the special impeller, of course. >>
Which is what the G-series is.. plastic euroreef type skimmer with the same type of output.. this is nothing new. I guess what it would amount to is price vs. quality of materials.
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