Recirculating skimmer for small tank?

[Benga]

Hi everyone, I recently downsized my entire tank from a 40B +20g to a 13g +20gsump.

My skimmer was the Bubble Magus Curve 7 which I'm having a lot of issues with now in that the water is just boiling and not foaming. I've but a air flow valve and even at near the lowest setting I'm barely able to get it to foam. I've ensured the proper water height and everything but I think it's just too strong for my tank and I'd also like to bring my water height back down.

So after watching the latest bed video on skimmer mistakes I think the recirculating skimmer is the best option for me because from what I can tell it doesn't matter what the water height is or how big the bio load is as much because of the tune-ability.

While I have a big area for a skimmer I would like it to be relatively small like the curve 7. My only issue is I can't find anything that's not crazy huge or $500+. Any suggestions for my tank size?

Bioload is 1 clown, 1 royal Gramma, two small corals. Feeding is once every other day using diy frozen fish from the best video a while back.

 

[Feet4Fish]

Honestly I wouldn’t mess with a skimmer. Super light bioload can manage with water changes or a small ATS

 

[mrpizzaface]

Honestly I wouldn’t mess with a skimmer. Super light bioload can manage with water changes or a small ATS

I would also recommend trying to do without a skimmer. Pretty easy to do a five gallon water change per week.

 

[Benga]

Honestly I wouldn’t mess with a skimmer. Super light bioload can manage with water changes or a small ATS

I would also recommend trying to do without a skimmer. Pretty easy to do a five gallon water change per week.

These are both good points. I do a 5g water change weekly using Tropic Marin pro salt. Which should be ample since it's 13g + maybe 7-10g sump since the whole 20g isn't utilized.

I've just never run a reef tank without a skimmer and it's not to say this skimmer isn't producing skimmate because it is just on the walls at the edges of the top of the neck where i have it set to instead of foaming out. I have my algae barn chaeto coming in this week along with my kessil h80 so i think with that and the water changes i can decommission skimmer.

I'm still getting some Dino algae though on my sandbed and rocks despite the waterchanges, vibrant and activated carbon(not that this would prevent it). I currently have the light as my prime suspect for this though but that'll be another thread.

Mind you this tank is only 3 months old

 

[Blue Ring Octopus]

WS-1 In-Sump Protein Skimmer

The highly-rated HOB-1 skimmer in an in-sump version!The AquaMaxx WS-1 protein skimmer features an incredibly responsive collection cup and an amazingly powerful submersible pump. It is rated up to 65 gallons in a design thin and light enough to be placed on a nano aquarium, all-in-one style...

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or a Tunze 9004