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My Grande Skimmer has no Filter Mat. Say What?

April
6th
PondMeister

 I always wondered why my 6,000 gallon pond with a Grande Skimmer and Grande BioFalls (The largest Skimmer and BioFalls Aquascape makes) was never as clear as my 3,000 gallon pond with the Standard Large Classic Skimmer and the Standard BioFalls.The only difference had to be the fact that my Grande Skimmer had a Debris Net but no Filter Mat while my Standard Skimmer had both.

I though my contractor had messed up and failed to leave me a mat.I tried to find out so I went to several chat rooms and had three different “Experts” give me part numbers for the correct Filter Mat which all turned out to be bogus. The answer was “None of the Above”. The Grande Skimmer was purposely designed without a Skimmer Mat I am told because of the fear of a huge pump sucking in the mat.

The ramifications of no mat however was that all the skimmer was “filtering” was what the Debris Net could catch and not much else. The whole purpose of a Skimmer is to do the Mechanical Filtrationwhich is to catch the “pieces of stuff” while allowing the BioFalls to do the Biological Filtration and convert the fish waste into Beneficial Bacteria. You only want to clean a BioFalls once a year as to not disturb the colonies of Beneficial Bacteria – especially with the Gi-normous Grande Biofalls which is HUGE and a really nasty job to clean.The result was a ton of debris ending up in the BioFalls rather than being caught by the skimmer.

After discussing the situation and my observations a few years ago with one of Aquascape’s crack Tech staff, they made a very simple schematic of a Grande Skimmer Rack  that could be made in minutes out of PVC pipe to elevate the filter mat above the pump(s) at the bottom of the skimmer and below the debris net and – Voila – I had a fully functioning Skimmer that actually filtered a lot of that annoying small particle matter that gives the pond a cloudy look.

Here are a couple of links to the mats you can use (I actually use 2 mats in mine)  the 2″ thick Poly-Flo Fusion Flow Purple Filter Material (AMEFF) on top of the rack which is very rigid and insures that the Filter Mat is not sucked into your pumps and then a 1″ thick dense White Filter Material (AMEJC1) on top of the Purple mat to catch some of the smaller particles.. I can even put in one of our new “Party-Pack Filter Mats” temporarily if I really want to clear up the water using a flocculant like Aquascape’s RapidClear .


date Posted on: Wednesday, April 6th, 2011 at 11:15 pm
Category Pond Tips.
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14 Responses to “My Grande Skimmer has no Filter Mat. Say What?”

  1. Lorraine

    I have the same skimmer. Does this pvc rack sit below the skimmer net? Did you cut the mat to go around the pump pipe?

    April 7th, 2011 at 4:18 am
     
  2. PondMeister

    Yes ..It will elevate the mat above the pump but below the Debris Net. Be saure not to Glue all the pieces together or you will not be able to get it in and out. You cut a straight line to a 2″ (or 3″ if you have 3″ pipe) Diameter Hole for your tubing. Please call me at 805-241-0141 to discuss.

    April 7th, 2011 at 6:01 am
     
  3. Laura

    We had a beautiful water fall and stream with pond installed this winter.We love it. We have a grande skimmer with out a mat.I thought the installer goofed up as well. This article is answered prayer. What a great article. I will build and install the rack and filters you used. Thank you PondMeister!!!

    April 20th, 2011 at 1:51 pm
     
  4. PondMeister

    Glad to hear it! Please let us know how it turns out.

    April 20th, 2011 at 10:48 pm
     
  5. Pond Tint

    Its my second visit to this blog. Every time I found some useful info here. I like the blog presentation and detail with picture and diagram.. Thanks again…!

    April 29th, 2011 at 2:02 pm
     
  6. Newbie

    I just purchased a house the has a pond and I try to understand PonMeister, but can’t seem to understand how it work and what it looks like, PondMeister would you please post some photos help me understand this set up please! Thanks, Tom

    May 24th, 2011 at 1:10 pm
     
  7. PondMeister

    Please call me at 805-241-0141 and I will try to help you.
    Richard

    May 28th, 2011 at 7:02 pm
     
  8. Rosemary

    Thanks so much…my husband and I went shopping this weekend to buy some wire to make a cage around the filters because to many leaves and other debris was making its way down to the pumps causing the pumps not to run as well as they should….but now thanks to you we will be making this skimmer net holder….I will let you know how it goes….

    May 29th, 2011 at 10:38 am
     
  9. PondMeister

    I think you will really like the results. Such a waste to have a skimmer and not really filter the water. Keep me posted with your results and/or innovations.

    May 29th, 2011 at 7:00 pm
     
  10. Bob

    I have the skimmer/pump but my “falls” is a hollowed out log that cascades water down a 25 foot stream. I can never seem to get the pond as clean as when I had the bio-falls. Should I have the contractor install a bio falls unit – the log looks great but the pond is difficult to keep clean.

    June 2nd, 2011 at 6:48 pm
     
  11. Jerry Falke

    Richard aka Pondmeister:

    Can’t tell you how much I appreciated your advice and instruction. It’s tough to believe that something so simple could be so effective! Why AquaScape has omitted this feature is incomprehensible.

    I followed your suggestions, but modified your PVC stand since I already had a ton of 1/2″ CPVC and Lowe’s didn’t have the type of corner connectors I needed in CPVC, so the legs are now 2″ off the corners and the crossbar supports are 9″ from each end of the filter box to avoid the mouth of the skimmer. The center support is built into the design of the Grande skimmer box, as we had discussed.

    That said, I put the 2 new Grande filters in the filter box along with my Matala filters and placed the purple filter in the skimmer box on the modified CPVC stand……and in less than 6 hrs the pond was crystalline…..and my fish appeared more active.

    Hasn’t looked like this in years. And, the thought that the filter box will not accumulate all that ‘sludge’ is awesome.

    Thank you for ‘simplifying’ my life.

    Fondest,

    Jerry.

    August 17th, 2014 at 11:49 am
     
  12. PondMeister

    Thanks Jerry – Welcome to the Grande Skimmer Club!

    August 17th, 2014 at 11:53 am
     
  13. Jerry Falke

    If you are able to modify my last post before posting it, could you change the “not” to “now”? The sentence should read “…..so the legs are now 2″ off the corners….”

    Thanks,

    Jerry

    August 17th, 2014 at 12:03 pm
     
  14. PondMeister

    Just fixed it – good catch

    August 17th, 2014 at 3:15 pm