Skimmer help!

Callahan88 · Jun 16, 2018

I have a 4th gen eshopps s300, I try and run the water about 8 inches. But for some reason this skimmer never pulls constant skim out, it will go good for a few days then I will check it and the water has dropped or risen. Also when I change a filter sock it will screw with it. I’m at a loss as of what to do. Anyone with the same skimmer that can help

Forsaken77 · Jun 16, 2018

Maybe we should check with the guy who just had an eshopps skimmer burn down his whole tank

...

Seriously though... Is your skimmer too big for the tank? That will happen when there's not enough nutrients for the size skimmer, it will idle.

Feeding or putting your hands in the tank will cause the water to drop in the skimmer as well. Takes a few hours to come back to normal.

I've also had a similar situation and I lowered the skimmer slightly and adjusted from there. My whacky skimmer will only really work with the gate valve more open (more air), so I had to drop the skimmer lower in order to raise the water inside without closing the valve to raise the water. It needed more water flowing through it with the valve open. So you have to balance out how much water passes through with the valve and manage the water level by height.

Don't know if that'll help because each skimmer is different.

Retro Reefer · Jun 16, 2018

If your bio load is not sufficient skimmers will tend to do that.. they work well until the water is stripped of proteins then they will slow down until the water gets dirty again. It doesn’t appear from the picture that your skimmer is sitting in 8” of water? Maybe take it off the stand for a while and see if that helps? and to clarify the statement made in the last post it wasn’t the eshopps skimmer that burned up it was the sicce pump that failed.. a rare occurrence from a very respected Italian pump manufacturer, I’ll also point out the pump was severely neglected.

vector824 · Jun 16, 2018

Yeah my skimmer would do the same thing. When I switched it to a chamber with a slightly higher water level it started working flawlessly and now it’s pulling poop out like no tomorrow.