No bubbles

[ihaveadane]

I did a water change Sunday night, plugged my Coral Life Skimmer back in, the water rose but no bubbles. I let it run all night/day. Came home tonight and still there are no bubbles. I took the pump a part and rinsed/wiped everything off. Blew out the venturi and connecting hose.

Any idea on how to make the venturi part work?

 

[bobz]

I've had the same problem with my Coralife Skimmers. Did the water level in the sump rise? My skimmer was very temperamental when it came to the height of the water in the sump and would stop producing bubbles until I lowered the water level. I was also able to "kick start" it by submerging the airline in the water until it began to suck air in to the venturi. This skimmer works great if the water level is constant but if it fluctuates it has problems.
BZ

 

[ihaveadane]

Water in the sump did rise - but it happens a few times a week and skimmer always worked well. I pushed everything to make sure it was tight and tried to "kick" start it but there were still no bubble. I have now angled the pump with the filter up and I have bubbles.

I can hear when it is working and there are bubbles - almost as if something in the pump is not working all the time. I guess I will have to see what it does tomorrow. Hopefully it will still be working.


Thanks for the help

 

[ihaveadane]

So I am still getting some bubbles this morning but the pressure is not consistent. The pump (for lack of a better term) is not producing bubbles at a steady rate. So there are bubbles, with little to no foam, then the water drops a little then the foam is gone. (what a pain)

I now have the user manual and I have pushed, resealed, blown out what I can... guess I will call the manufacture. Amazingly enough it is still under warranty. (for 5 more days):huh:

 

[bobz]

Please let me know what you find out. I've had the exact same issues with my Coralife and the only way I was able to get it to consistently work was to raise the pump in the sump (since I did not want to lower the water level) so that it was only a couple of inches below the surface. It seemed to fix this issues but not sure why. It's been working that way for the past six months until I swapped it out for a DAS. Now it is on my frag tank and still working ok.
BZ

 

[c0mputernick]

I also have the same problem. I will try to reposition the pump closer to the water surface and see if that helps. I would always lose bubbles from time to time and just by luck found that if i put my palm over the back half of the filter cone that comes off the pump the bubbles would start back up. So i got creative and put hot glue on half the cone (on one side) to fill the holes and it worked for about 4 months that way with really rich bubbles, but recently decided it didnt want to produce bubbles anymore. Im going to take the whole thing apart and clean it and try moving the pump higher and see what i get. I felt it was a little lop sided and didnt want to stand correctly with the pump "hanging" in the water so i have it resting on the sump bottom. Since i finally got my auto top off working i dont have to worry about the sump level fluctuating anymore, so moving the pump higher just might work for me.

Thanks for the tip!
(and thanks bobz for the coral at the meeting yesterday, its looking very healthy)

 

[dannybradley]

There two issues with that skimmer are both related to pump depth.

1. Venturis cannot draw air they are too deep under water. Within the intructions it lists the recommended depths for those pumps.

2. Those skimmers are hyper sensitive to changes in water pressure and density. These both occur with evaporation and sudden top-off. The only way to correct this is with an automatic top-off system. The only luck I've ever had with those skimmers is keeping the water level constant.

 

[bobz]

Danny,
I agree. Once I added a top off to the tank, the skimmer worked better. I did find that the recommended depth of 3" to the top of the pump that the instruction manual states was a bit too deep for my skimmer and it worked more consistently with about 2" of water above the pump in my sump.
Bob

 

[dannybradley]

Raising the pump closer to the surface causes to to draw more air, and consequently, less water. That should inturn cause it to skim drier, but that also has a lot to do with the height of the bubble column.

 

[c0mputernick]

It worked for me. I raised the pump up about 3 inches and it started skimming again.

Thanks for the tip!