Coralife Protein Skimmer Mishap

[Hiker4twenty]

So about an hour before I went to bed last night I made a small adjustment to the water level on my skimmer. It seemed to do the trick and the foam was nice and frothy. I woke up this morning to find about a gallon of water had leaked through the air hole in the top of the collection cup all over my carpt. :frustrat: So now I have the drain tube hooked up into an empty gallon water jug. Should have done this from the start.

 

[daugherty]

as yote would say if you ain't flodding you ain't reefen

 

[Hiker4twenty]

Well I guess I was reefen all night while I was sleepin.

 

[daugherty]

i had my skimmer over flow a month ago and it dumped a couple gallons on my hardwood floorit was such a big mess

 

[Navarchus]

So now I have the drain tube hooked up into an empty gallon water jug. Should have done this from the start.

Yes. Those drain tubes are there for a reason, and that reason is to prevent your floor from getting wet.

My skimmer drain tube leads to a 5 gallon bucket (courtesy of Instant Ocean) and I run the skimmer hard enough to pull out about a couple of gallons a week. In fact, when I do water changes, I lead the PS drain to a 30gallon tank and crank it up until the desired amoung of H2O has been removed. By doing this I take the crud out of the tank with the water.

 

[lilyicu]

I have a large plastic bowl under my coralife skimmer. You never know when they are going to act up. The bowl is great. When there is water in it I just empty it out. The problems I have now is sometimes I don't seem to be able to screw the top back on tight enough and it drips. My safety bowl is always there :)

 

[ccCapt]

Very common occurance with those CSS skimmers. Before I got rid of mine, I stuck it inside my sump so when it flooded nothing spilled outside the sump.

 

[Hiker4twenty]

Very common occurance with those CSS skimmers. Before I got rid of mine, I stuck it inside my sump so when it flooded nothing spilled outside the sump.

I had originally planned to put the skimmer in my fuge, but I only have a 10g so the space was not big enough. So I have it as a hang on the side of my fuge.

 

[Hiker4twenty]

i had my skimmer over flow a month ago and it dumped a couple gallons on my hardwood floorit was such a big mess

It sucks on whatever type of flooring I'm sure. My carpets are beige so now I have a rusty colored stain on my carpet. By the way...that Bakpak skimmer I got from you is now in use on my brother's 29g BC. He already had a skimmer so he turned it into a small hob fuge. Working well.

 

[daugherty]

that is great to hear that it is working good

 

[andysgirl8800]

I took one of those shallow square rubbermade bins (about 4" deep) and set my skimmer inside of it. I've had just a couple of incidents where there was an overflow, and it just went into the bin.

 

[yote]

The first thing I learned when I got my first CSS,was dont touch the adjustment knob unless I had a full day to sit and watch it.:D Turn it just a hair and you might flood the floor.
James beat me to the rest of my post:D

 

[lilyicu]

I always feel I am making adjustments to the skimmer.....but like Yote said, I don't touch it if I don't have time to watch it over several hours.