keeping protein skimmer running

[sergifed91]

I was wondering if I am doing anything wrong for the past week. I am only running my protein skimmer while I'm at home and not at work. I realize most run there's 24/7. but recently when I leave it unattended it seems to just start running hard and filling the cup and then when I return it's over flowing and water on the floor. I run it 6 hours Monday through Thursday and the Friday 6 to 7 hours and then Saturday and sunday 12 -14 hours. I turn it off if I leave the house if I know i'm going to be gone for more then 10 minutes at a time. just for the reason I don't want to clean up water anymore.

I haven't made any changes to my tank at all. no additives at all. i'm running an eshopps PSK-100H. HOB Skimmer. I have had it since april. I did however do a thorough cleaning of the skimmer last week. Is it breaking in again and I need to wait a while for it to break back in? I have dialed it down as much as I could on this skimmer. so there has to be something causing the overflowing of the skimmer or some changes I'm not a ware of going on with the tank. My last WC was this past Friday. and still it hasn't approved the problem. I might have to call eshopp for support on this.

 

[Crabs McJones]

I was wondering if I am doing anything wrong for the past week. I am only running my protein skimmer while I'm at home and not at work. I realize most run there's 24/7. but recently when I leave it unattended it seems to just start running hard and filling the cup and then when I return it's over flowing and water on the floor. I run it 6 hours Monday through Thursday and the Friday 6 to 7 hours and then Saturday and sunday 12 -14 hours. I turn it off if I leave the house if I know i'm going to be gone for more then 10 minutes at a time. just for the reason I don't want to clean up water anymore.

I haven't made any changes to my tank at all. no additives at all. i'm running an eshopps PSK-100H. HOB Skimmer. I have had it since april. I did however do a thorough cleaning of the skimmer last week. Is it breaking in again and I need to wait a while for it to break back in? I have dialed it down as much as I could on this skimmer. so there has to be something causing the overflowing of the skimmer or some changes I'm not a ware of going on with the tank. My last WC was this past Friday. and still it hasn't approved the problem. I might have to call eshopp for support on this.

Could be breaking back in. Another thing to check is the air inlet line. Alot of times when they get deep cleaned and their is salt creep on the walls of the line, it breaks off and clogs the air intake causing it to overflow. Make sure all your air lines are clean, if they are probably just needs to break in again

 

[sergifed91]

Could be breaking back in. Another thing to check is the air inlet line. Alot of times when they get deep cleaned and their is salt creep on the walls of the line, it breaks off and clogs the air intake causing it to overflow. Make sure all your air lines are clean, if they are probably just needs to break in again

it's running a little better this evening. i'm turning it off at 11 tonight to go to bed. then when I get home from the doctors in the afternoon i'll start it back up again and let it run. I am going to make some modifications to it though. take the air intake hose run it to the out side and the cup has a over flow hose to it. i'm going to get a bigger hose and run it to my sewer drain in the basement to see if it does over flow again it will run on that. I might also make 2 more holes in the cup and run a total of the over flow out takes in it to be on the safe side.

 

[skysoblue987]

I would run it all the time. It oxygenate the water and help keep your PH high.

 

[sergifed91]

I would run it all the time. It oxygenate the water and help keep your PH high.

I would like to. but until it stops over flowing in the cup. I won't be running it all the time. I'm trying to get the issue resolved so I can run it all the time.

 

[WVNed]

it's running a little better this evening. i'm turning it off at 11 tonight to go to bed. then when I get home from the doctors in the afternoon i'll start it back up again and let it run. I am going to make some modifications to it though. take the air intake hose run it to the out side and the cup has a over flow hose to it. i'm going to get a bigger hose and run it to my sewer drain in the basement to see if it does over flow again it will run on that. I might also make 2 more holes in the cup and run a total of the over flow out takes in it to be on the safe side.

Dumping it where you cant see it can be dangerous if you have an ATO. The skimmer will pump water down the drain and the ATO will make up the volume and drop your salinity and your tank will crash.

Routing the intake air from outside is a great idea . I wish I could.

 

[sergifed91]

Dumping it where you cant see it can be dangerous if you have an ATO. The skimmer will pump water down the drain and the ATO will make up the volume and drop your salinity and your tank will crash.

Routing the intake air from outside is a great idea . I wish I could.

I don't have a ATO. I don't even do that. I so weekly water changes and don't even worry about toping it off every week. as far as running it outside for the air intake. I'm waiting for my air conditioning unit to be replaced. there going to run new hoses inside and when they do that I'm gonna sneak in and run the hose in the same spot then over about 3 feet to keep it out of any contaminates the air conditioning might put off. if it does put any off. I know they use Freon. so keeping it away some if there is ever a leak. it will keep it at a minimum. or I might even run it further away from the conditioning unit to be on the safe side.

 

[Crabs McJones]

I don't have a ATO. I don't even do that. I so weekly water changes and don't even worry about toping it off every week.

Are you doing your water changes with a lower salt content then? Not topping off with freshwater in between water changes I would think would make your salinity go up.

 

[sergifed91]

Are you doing your water changes with a lower salt content then? Not topping off with freshwater in between water changes I would think would make your salinity go up.

I do roughly around a 24 g a week. that does raise it up to 1.030 for my salinity but I only mix salt to 17 gallons and then just add rodi from there.and it brings it down to 1.026

 

[WVNed]

With my RO HOB skimmer I had to raise it to get it to run well. This is equivalent to running a sump skimmer in less water.
I used a piece of a fat plastic coat hanger.
Try slipping something between the skimmer and the tank rim. Eshoppes says start with 1 inch PVC.

How to stop the skimmer from overflowing: Raise the skimmer by placing a 1-inch
PVC pipe (10 inches long) under the black bracket across two grey arms. Let the
skimmer run in this position for 3-5 hours. Once the skimmer settles down, you
can remove the PVC to lower the skimmer.

If you don't have an ATO the tank level will allways change over time and you will not be able to keep it dialed in though.

 

[Crabs McJones]

I do roughly around a 24 g a week. that does raise it up to 1.030 for my salinity but I only mix salt to 17 gallons and then just add rodi from there.and it brings it down to 1.026

Just be careful swinging your salinity like that, your corals may not like it

 

[sergifed91]

With my RO HOB skimmer I had to raise it to get it to run well. This is equivalent to running a sump skimmer in less water.
I used a piece of a fat plastic coat hanger.
Try slipping something between the skimmer and the tank rim. Eshoppes says start with 1 inch PVC.

How to stop the skimmer from overflowing: Raise the skimmer by placing a 1-inch
PVC pipe (10 inches long) under the black bracket across two grey arms. Let the
skimmer run in this position for 3-5 hours. Once the skimmer settles down, you
can remove the PVC to lower the skimmer.

If you don't have an ATO the tank level will allways change over time and you will not be able to keep it dialed in though.

I just started having this problem with the skimmer. I cleaned it and it started over flowing. it might be breaking in again. but I am going to try to put a few shims to raise it up a little to see what that gets me. I have tons of them I never use. thought I would toss most of them out since I never use them and don't need a whole paper box full anyway.

 

[Greybeard]

Varying salinity can have significant effects on skimmer adjustment. I'd try and come up with some solution to keep the salinity from bouncing. Might help the skimmer, might not... will certainly cause less stress to the animals in the tank.

As for the skimmer, honestly, the Eshopps HOB is probably my favorite HOB design, but, that said, there are reasons why many of us spend several times as much on a high end skimmer. One of those reasons is for better adjustability in the skimmer, and more stable skimmate production.

I've had lots of skimmers over the years, inexpensive skimmers like Lee, Coralife, Hydor... Oddball skimmers, yeah, I had a Skilter . Sort of 'mid range'... ran a Super Reef Octopus 1000sss for some time. Good skimmer, but I had to play with it to keep it running. I've had some very nice quality stuff, too... Had a PM Bullet2 Beckett injector design, awesome skimmer, though it sounded a bit like a jet engine warming up These days, I'm running a Vertex. Aside from having a pump fail on me (Vertex US support went out of their way to get me a replacement, fairly quickly... but it was expensive!), I rarely have to touch it. Empty the cup every week, and let it run. Even with the pump failure, it's probably the best, most stable skimmer I've ever owned. And yeah, they're pricey.

 

[sergifed91]

just got home turned on the skimmer and after an hour it seems to be going back to normal. hopefully it will stay that way...

 

[sergifed91]

I found some plastic clear tubing and ended up cutting a 5 inch piece off and folded it in half and put it under the skimmer to raise it up. seems that it helped but going to let it run for a few hours to see the results. if I will need to tune it a little bit more.