coralife s.s.

[fishbait]

for those of you with the coralife super skimmer, mine has been acting up for the last week. poor bubble production, the bubble level won't stay set, it either overflows the collection cup or doesn't hardlly make any bubbles at all. I took this thing out rinsed really good, ran it in a freshwater-vinegar solution for 6 hours. rinsed and scrubed again. took the pump apart and cleaned every inch of it, blew through all the holes. and nothing fixed it. so, i got bored today (i'm vacation this week) and took it out again. went through it again with a fine tooth comb! after pulling the air venturi out and looking down inside the little hole that draws the air in...bam! there was the problem. the hole was plugged 3/4 of the way with salt creep. a good reaming with a toothpick unplugged it. and now it's back to new performance again! just thought i would share the info in case some you other c.s.s. owners out there are encountering or this problem. or if it happens to you on down the road.

 

[bobby]

Thanks. I'll deffinetly keep it in mind with mine if I ever have that problem.

 

[reeffreak]

Very informative Fish.

On my skimmer and on many other skimmer there are sometimes an airline from the skimmer cup to the venturi.The condensation flushes the venturi with freshwater to keep salt creep from clogging the venturi.I don't believe it totally elements the clogging but definitely reduce it.

 

[yote]

Thanks for the tip Fish.

 

[fishbait]

you bet yote

 

[joeman]

Hi Fishbait, I have two SS's and have the same issue - need to clean mine out about every other month....

I have recently encountered a second issue = pump losing power. I have had one SS for about 2 yrs and the other for 18mnths. Both were not producing the bubbles quite like they used to (I could look through the skimmer and see my hand on the other side). As I was playing around (cleaning etc) to see if I could find out what was wrong, I removed the protective cage thingy and pushed my finger into the intake - the skimmer burst into life with thick bubble production.

To cut a long story short, the pumps had lost power and thus could not maintain a high enough water velocity past the venturi air intake to draw much air. By pocking my finger in I restricted the flow path and thus increased the velocity of the water flow = lots of bubbles again :-)

As a longer term solution (one which avoids me needing to keep my finger stuck in the intake or buying a new pump) I cut a 1cm long piece of vinal tubing (3/4" ID fit mine) and simply pushed it into the end of the cage thingy. the cage thingy then slots back into the intake and now restricts the flow = high water velocity past the venturi intake = lots of bubbles :Cheers:

I'll post some pictures when I get chance if that helps.

 

[fishbait]

thanks for the tip joeman. I thought that maybe my pump was running slow too. then I found the holes plugged with salt creep. I was excited to find out that i didn't have to buy a new pump!

 

[jhnrb]

I run warm ro water through the air intake of the pumps to dissolve the build up while the pumps are running seems to work well. just a tip that may or may not help you between tear downs.