hob filter or protien skimmer

[sansouci01]

What would be a better investment for a 20 gallon tank. A protein skimmer or a hob filter.

 

[Oscar98]

Skimmer. If you have a lot of LR that is a good enough filter. Unless you are talking about a filter as in a fuge then that.

 

[sansouci01]

Thanks.
This will be my first salt tank. I am going to have both live rock and live sand. About 20lbs of rock and 10lbs of sand..Any suggestions for a skimmer? Wondering if the small skimmers work. Don't want to have to spend 150 bucks for a skimmer..

 

[Oscar98]

Thanks.
This will be my first salt tank. I am going to have both live rock and live sand. About 20lbs of rock and 10lbs of sand..Any suggestions for a skimmer? Wondering if the small skimmers work. Don't want to have to spend 150 bucks for a skimmer..

If you dont want a filter get a skimmer rated for 2-3x the size of your tank

 

[carey]

With skimmers you do get what you pay for. Having aid that, I have several small skimmers and I find I like the aquaticlife one the best. They are about $40 used on ebay and $60 new. Much better than the biocube skimmers and the new fluval skimmer.

If ypu can manage to keep up water changes you can skip the skimmer in such a small tank. I did in the past and just stuck with a larger hang on back filter. I only added a skimmer a few months later when I was going to upgrade the tank.

Hope that helps.

 

[carey]

Hey OP, I see youre in Orlando...I am in Deltona not too far away.
I can tell you the best stores to go to, I have been to them all lol

 

[sansouci01]

I'm about 3 miles from world wide corals. Have everything you need ...for a price..They have some beautiful tanks and fish

 

[carey]

Yeah, WWC is expensive but they have some really nice stuff. You need to try Top Shelf as well, they are on Aloma.

 

[sansouci01]

thanks for the info. I live about a mile from Sea world. Winter park is about a 25 minute ride from me. have to check them out this weekend...

 

[carey]

They by far have the largest and cheapest fish selection that I've found. I frequent about 15 different stores and i have always gotten a good deal at top shelf. There is a convention Saturday, the space coast reef convention. Good stuff and all the local stores will be there with their best corals.

Only $10 to get in too and they are having a killer raffle as usual. In case you might be interested.....

 

[sansouci01]

sounds cool...but I'm one of those poor people that have to work on Saturday.....lol do you know if top shelf is open on sunday's

 

[jefferzbooboo]

I had an Eshopps PSK-75H and it worked great for 3 years, it never overflowed. The pump finally quit and I couldn't find a replacement, I had a first generation one. It was a pain to clean because the bubble plate wasn't removable.
I got a Reef Octopus BH1000 after and like it. It's a better skimmer IMO but it's more touchy about being affected by water level in the tank and will overflow. It is pretty easy to clean. The Octopus is $50ish more though.
If you have an ATO I'd go Octopus no questions asked, but if not I'd go the Eshopps. That's my 2 cents between those 2.
This is on a 20H

 

[carey]

Top Shelf is open Sunday. or they should be, unless they are closing for the conference