Help I've got a big problem

[acer]

Had this exact this happen to me last week. skimmer running perfect for months, then at night it went crazy and the foam, overflowed the cup , ran down and due to it being thick foam a portion made it over the sump rim, so lost water , and the ATO replaced as I lost water, but I have a 65 gallon and only a 5 gallon ATO- so salinity was OK. I only had to clean up about 3 gallons of water. I still dont know why the skimmer went nutz. But I moved it away from the edge of the sump a bit so there was no way if I had another overflow that the foam would get out of the sump again.

 

[Reef Junky150]

I just plugged my skimmer back up and went to touch the water. I got a good shock out of it. I'm thinking something is up with the motor on it and it's the reason for the overflow problem. So not only have I had a sudden change of salinity, I've sent a electrical current through the fish and coral all night. Shut the skimmer back off and the shock is gone

Need a gfci asap to prevent this and a ground probe to save yourself. Stray voltage for a short period will have little affect compared to the salinity swing

 

[salttanklife]

I've got everything hooked up to ground faults but for some reason it didn't trip it. I removed the skimmer and was still getting shocked. Did the unplug one at a time thing and now it's my heater. Definitely not the way I was looking to spend this Sunday. Sunday is my coral buying day and not coral killing day. Looks like I still get to go shopping, but now it's for a new heater and possibly a new skimmer. Going to hook it back up and see if that was even the problem for the shock at first. I unplugged it and didn't feel a shock, so I took it out. Maybe I did something to the heater while removing it.

 

[Reef Junky150]

I've got everything hooked up to ground faults but for some reason it didn't trip it. I removed the skimmer and was still getting shocked. Did the unplug one at a time thing and now it's my heater. Definitely not the way I was looking to spend this Sunday. Sunday is my coral buying day and not coral killing day. Looks like I still get to go shopping, but now it's for a new heater and possibly a new skimmer. Going to hook it back up and see if that was even the problem for the shock at first. I unplugged it and didn't feel a shock, so I took it out. Maybe I did something to the heater while removing it.

It happens friend, may I suggest titanium
Also a ground probe and voltmeter to be safer in checking for stray voltage than the feel test

 

[salttanklife]

Definitely will check into those....

I plugged the skimmer up in the sink and didn't receive a shock. So the heater was the problem all along. Could the heater messing up overnight sending electricity through the water cause the overflow problem? Seems like it would to me but I'm not 100% sure

 

[Reef Junky150]

I've had stray voltage before I installed gfci and grounded probe and never saw any ill effects. I don't see how it would cause skimmer to overflow personally but can't be ruled out. If anything the short imo would possibly draw more voltage away from skimmer pump causing the opposite effect.