Venturi Not Sucking Air

akabryanhall · Apr 7, 2012

Is there a trick to it? My pump is running, no air bubbles. Tried blowing air into it..

slapshot · Apr 7, 2012

Clogged up. Take a cup of r/o water and run a tube from the Venturi to the cup. Let it suck up all the water. It will clean it out

_sludgefactory · Apr 8, 2012

Might have to take it apart and poke something in there, it's probably clogged with salt creep.

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Poseidon · Apr 8, 2012

If you take it out of the tank, a 30 minute bath in 50/50 vinegar and hot water would do wonders for the pump and venturi.

(Make sure to rinse it well before putting it back in the tank.)

akabryanhall · Apr 8, 2012

Thanks guys, I should have elaborated. When I blew air into the tube, bubbles came out of the intake to the pump but no bubbles went into the pump. I've got bubbles to go into the skimmer briefly but not so that it "catches" so to speak.

skinz78 · Apr 8, 2012

I've had the same problem before, it was a small goober of hard superglue that got stuck in there. As stated above, take it apart and give it a though inspection/cleaning.

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akabryanhall · Apr 10, 2012

Well the Venturi is definitely not clogged. Blew into it. Can get it to spit some micro bubbles into the skimmer then water climbs up the tube. Any other ideas?

Poseidon · Apr 10, 2012

Have you actually taken the pump out of the tank and cleaned it, or just blew into the tube?

If the pump is dirty, it WILL NOT draw like it is supposed to.

mcarroll · Apr 10, 2012

Poseidon said:
If you take it out of the tank, a 30 minute bath in 50/50 vinegar and hot water would do wonders for the pump and venturi. (Make sure to rinse it well before putting it back in the tank.)

+1 - takes care of almost all of what can ail a pump.

akabryanhall said:
Thanks guys, I should have elaborated. When I blew air into the tube, bubbles came out of the intake to the pump but no bubbles went into the pump. I've got bubbles to go into the skimmer briefly but not so that it "catches" so to speak.

Emphasis mine. Sounds like your pump is running backward!

skinz78 said:
I've had the same problem before, it was a small goober of hard superglue that got stuck in there. As stated above, take it apart and give it a though inspection/cleaning.

+1

It doesn't happen all the time, but anything that slightly obstructs the impeller in the "correct way" can make a pump begin operation running backward - including a tiny piece of sand, a slightly swelled magnet or a little bit of nearly-invisible Calcium buildup in the impeller well. Can initially be very hard to see the swelling too - look for scuff marks around the middle of the magnet, or any unusual amount anywhere on it, really.

I say take it apart for a visual inspection, then run/soak it in a 10%-50% vinegar solution and test it again. Still doesn't work? Repeat one more time. Also, call or otherwise reach out to the manufacturer if you haven't already - they may have a suggestion or even a replacement part for you.

Good luck!

-Matt

P.S. This (possible sand/dirt messing with the impeller) could be an indication that it's time to siphon out the sump as well....often is for me.

skinz78 · Apr 10, 2012

My pump would run and I could blow air in it but it still wouldn't work till I cleaned it.

Henry C · Apr 10, 2012

what kind of skimmer are you running? The reason I ask is that I had a problem with my bubble magus where I couldn't get good bubbles. I thought the pump was going bad because I could blow into the hose with no problem,but still wasn't getting good bubbles. I took the venturi off numerous times and cleaned it with hot water and nothing worked. I ended up going to lowes and buying a fitting and installed a venturi from an asm skimmer and now the thing is rocking some serious foam. So basically the venturi design for my skimmer sucked...