Skimmer going nuts following medication,

[Pete Hammersley]

Hi,
I’ve had my skimmer offline while I used a combination or polyplab medic peroxide salts and melafix. I used the medic for 10 days first, whilst still skimming successfully, then both for the following week, so 17 days total. I did not skim for those 7 days as instructed with melafix, then left it in there for a further 3 days to settle.
20 days in now, all my treatment has finished and

I want to get my tank up and running again, so I’ve done a proper clean of all my sump. I’ve done 4 x10% water changes back to back, and still the skimmer has is going nuts! I have it on minimum, in the minimus depth of water and put 2 thin 6mm tubes onto the air intake of the skimmer to slow it down a bit.

How do I get this stuff out? My tank is pretty big, Red Sea reefer cal 750, and I can’t store, heat and mix enough salt to make enough of an impact.
I have 6 x 25 litre water barrels, an 80 litre drum.
I have a plenty of salt, but can only hear and mix small amounts. I’m wasting a lot of this good salt by doing small changes, because every time I do a change I’m taking out 10% of the good water I put in before!

any idea how to get this water clean enough that I can get my skimmer back online?
Thanks.

 

[WVNed]

I can drain my collection cup to a bucket because it has a drain. I disable the ATO and add back NSW as the skimmer drains to the bucket and I let it foam away. This usually works over 4 hours or so for me. Tiny amounts of water added like this do not need to be heated.

That way the water you are changing has the maximum amount of what you are trying to remove in it.

 

[jd371]

When I've run Chemiclean the same would happen. This is what I did to get the skimmer running properly. The first thing I do is run GAC first for few hours. I then sit next to the skimmer with a fresh bucket of mixed water and another bucket to empty the skimmer cup into. I let the skimmer empty into the bucket and add fresh water to the sump as the level gets low. Sometimes it takes a little while and sometimes less to get the skimmer so it's skimming again. With my 75g the few times I've done this the shortest was about 15 min and the longest was a 1/2 hr.

 

[homer1475]

I can drain my collection cup to a bucket because it has a drain. I disable the ATO and add back NSW as the skimmer drains to the bucket and I let it foam away. This usually works over 4 hours or so for me. Tiny amounts of water added like this do not need to be heated.

That way the water you are changing has the maximum amount of what you are trying to remove in it.

I do this exact thing. last time I tried chemiclean, I ended up changing out about 50% of my water when the skimmer finally settled down.

 

[Pete Hammersley]

I can drain my collection cup to a bucket because it has a drain. I disable the ATO and add back NSW as the skimmer drains to the bucket and I let it foam away. This usually works over 4 hours or so for me. Tiny amounts of water added like this do not need to be heated.

That way the water you are changing has the maximum amount of what you are trying to remove in it.

Thank you, that is pretty much what I’m trying at the moment, but can only go at the speed my RODI unit can produce water. They lie terribly with ratings on these, it states it’s a 200 GPD, I can only get one 25 litre barrel every 2 hrs!
nice to know that if I keep doing this you have been able to solve it in this way.

 

[Pete Hammersley]

I do this exact thing. last time I tried chemiclean, I ended up changing out about 50% of my water when the skimmer finally settled down.

Thank you, just put 8 heaped tablespoons of carbon in, will swap it out tomorrow.