Turned my Durso overflow drain into a skimmer

[MarsReefer]

My tank has a single drain line and 2 returns. Instead of messing with it too much I did a pretty standard Durso overflow with a reverse durso drain line. In order to reduce the noise I did a 45 degree turn into a 90, and then ended it with a deep drain down and an air escape up.

This led to the air bubbles breaking up into micro bubbles instead of bigger bubbles so instead of a gurgleing sound I have a misting sound that is very quiet in operation.

After running for about a month I realized that the microbubles were so intense that it was forming quite a nice skimmate coming out of the top air tube. of course as is it just drained back into the tank. I don't have a skimmer on the tank yet as it is just getting its first fish so it wasn't collecting much. I decided instead of shelling out for a skimmer i'd just modify the top tube into a collection cup. I bought a 6" PVC end cap for $20, drilling a hole in it to fit the air tube and then cemented and sealed it together. Below is a video of the result



Bio load is very low (2 clowns in a 130 gallon DT) but it collected a few tsp's of skim so far and foams up a few hours after feeding. Biggest downside is that it is located before the filters so we'll see if it gets overloaded once my bio load increases, but for now it seems to be working well, is nearly silent, and only cost me $20.

 

[KrisReef]

Nice!
Highly recommend adding a lid on the collection cup to manage salt creep. You probably should have patented your design, but I wonder if it will create a new product for the hobby?