Overflowing Protein Skimmer

[roypersson]

Hello,

I've been messing around with this Coralife 65 gallon protein skimmer for months now. It haphazardly just decides to throw out too much water at random times.

When it happens in the middle of the night I loose two to three gallons on the floor just to give you the idea of how much it overflows. Its destroying my apartment floor.

The final straw was on Thursday night when the water drip hit a back up battery APC unit which exploded. Lucky for me all the fish tank gear still works. Unlucky for me it was a heart attack of a wake up at 4am. Yes I know that the cords need to have a loop to stop this drip problem but somehow I accidently tugged / pulled at this causing it to loose its loop.

So before everyone hits me with things like "adjust" the knob. Or adjust the height of the unit please keep in mind that I have been trialing and erroring these variables for MONTHS!!!! Also - when this freak overflow occurred the valve was set to the bare minimum. AND in addition I just cleaned out the skimmer top to bottom two weeks earlier.

I'm about to throw this thing in the trash... I can't figure it out and I'm just very upset that I can not figure out how to make this problem go away.

Right now its hanging on the back of my tank... unplugged. Wondering how long it can be that way till I get a nitrate spike.

Maybe I am missing something here? Please help.

Thanks,

 

[mbg75]

I had problems with mine also. Eventually got it dialed in close. There are many mods out there to improve it. I picked up a different skimmer and haven't gone back.

Are u running it in the sump? Is the skimmer in an area with a constant water height? Or does it drop with evaporation?

 

[skene]

Well let's see how your setup is... do you have the return going into the supplied bubble trap? If you do how far into the trap is the return pipe? It should not be directly laying into the trap as that what may be your issue. I did that one time and found water shooting out from the collection cup.

 

[Reefmaster95]

same with mine i have a reef octopus and its submerged only 6 inches and with the valve wide open it wont stop overflowing. i think its from the silicone from the new sump i just made so is there any type of chemical you recently added to the tank? you can try adding some activated carbon to help remove it. if not then i would just call the company.

EDIT: i just got back from the movies and i come home and my whole basement was flooded. the skimmer just started overflowing so much it was like pointing a pump it the air. it just blew the top off and started hitting off the top of the stand (which is the bottom of the DT) and bouncing onto the floor. my ATO bucket was completely empty and the basement was like a giant puddle. I HATE THIS THING!!!!
so definitely call the company if you cant fix it. and if its hanging on the back of your tank i feel bad for you because thats even worse if it overflows on the back rather then in the sump. Oh well, Good Luck!

 

[roypersson]

Yes my skimmer is hanging on the back of the tank. As a result the water level does go up and down a bit so I know that can effect it. But seriously... running with the valve at minimum with nothing in the collection cup for days and day and then going from that to tossing gallons on the floor is not related to a little evaporation from the tank.

And yes the thing is destroying my apartment floor.... its gonna cost me some coin when I eventually move out of here.

I dont have the hose "in" the return cup. I have it stretch out about a foot laying on the very edge of the cup. as a matter of fact water typically flows over the edge of the return cup into the display tank.

so I guess there are no solid tricks on getting this thing dialed in accurately and keeping it that way. I guess I am gonna have to put it in the sump tank. If it overflows in the sump tank everything should be okay right? It would just overflow into a tank that will eventually pump right back into the display tank right?

 

[bigdog1428]

There is a mod to control the flow better ,, do a search for it let me see if I can find it for u guys

 

[mbg75]

If it's hanging on the back of the main tank with a sump, then all evap would be in the sump.

if u decide to put it in the sump, make sure it's in a baffled section, so the water level always stays constant.


as far as mods, the pump intake should be within 2 inches of the surface, also you can mod the outlet so you no longer use the red knob and bubble box. the bubble box can cause back pressure allowing skimmer to overflow.



here's a pic.

 

[dj ze]

i had the same problem with my super reef octo the problem was my pump was defected it was always working but with limited pressure when the pump ran at it's true peak it would overflow so test your pump in a bucket with water and apply a little bit of pressure at the outlet where the water comes out to see if it reacts any diferent