DIY skimmer for a small tank

eric.battani · Nov 24, 2018

So i started to get a thin film on the surface of my water. My tank is so small plus it's an all in one aquarium so space is severely limited. I've had this tank for close to five years best i can tell and never really ran a skimmer in it. Anyhow I need to clean the water a little more than my normal phosgaurd, carbon, and filter floss in a nano reactor. So I went to the internet looking for a suitable skimmer that may fit. But I couldn't find one that would fit in my small space that I have available. Plus i would need to remove my lid, which I don't want to run the chance of a fish jumping out. So i went back looking for a diy option that might work. It's an old school design but I had all the items in my spare parts fish box. I took a air pump, air stone, some straight air line tubing, flexible tubing, a rubber stopper, and some rigid 1 one tubing. I have two holes in the rubber stopper. On holds the rigid tubing (on the left) going to the air stone, the other is flexible tubing (on the right) that goes to a bowl to catch skimate.

I know it's really high out of the water in this picture but I raised it up so you could see it better. It's currently about 2 inches above the water level right now.
So now after it breaks in, I can adjust it to the height i need. And hopefully after a couple days I can remove it and store it till I need it again.

beaslbob · Nov 26, 2018

H@rry · Nov 30, 2018

How do you circulate tank water within the tube? I know it will fill up when you first put it in the water but after that aren't you just skimming the same water in the tube?

eric.battani · Dec 1, 2018

H@rry said:
How do you circulate tank water within the tube? I know it will fill up when you first put it in the water but after that aren't you just skimming the same water in the tube?

As the air bubbles rise, it moves water from under the tube up inside. So the only water that gets skimmed is the water that passes under it. It's not the best of skimmers, but it served it's purpose for now. But hey it did work, the film on top of my water is now gone!