I've ordered a hand cranked rotary pump for £20 and will see how this goes. whilst i can see the ease and simplicity of skimming by hand, i think that once you have descended about a foot into the barrel it's going to get nasty and i'm with sixto on this.
'that's a stage too keen for me'
i will let you know how i get on. I have to say though, i was suprised jsut how viscous that stuff was, this has me leaning toward making my own biodiesel rather than just mixing in a bit of WVO.