Gravity fed skimmer?

[Bugeater281]

Anyone gravity feed their skimmers? Just bought a recirculating skimmer that will be outside the sump. The owners manual mention gravity feeding it. Can’t seem to find a ton of info on doing this(less pumps is always great).

Tank is a 135g acrylic with a 2in drain, return pump is a vectra m1. Skimmer is a skimz sm202. Im setting up the tank now, so I’m trying to decide how to plumb it. Skimmer calls for 5-600gph, so about half of my water would run through the skimmer if I had my turnover rate at 1200gph. I figured with this setup I could bypass the refugium to keep flow through the refugium slower. Having the skimmer dump back into the return pump chamber.

Thoughts? Anyone with experience doing gravity fed skimmers?

 

[lapin]

Hum; Having the skimmer dump bubble filled water into the return chamber will cause bubbles in your main tank

 

[steves]

Works fine but you might need to add an extra air pump for injecting to boost the output.