Little help need with a beckett skimmer

[Vauche]

I will start by saying I am pleased with my MRC-2 skimmer, I never knew skimmate stunk so much, but I do have one little issue that is causing me some grief.

The WATER LEVEL in the skimmer body.

Basically I seem to always be tweaking it because it will never stay stable. After I set it where it is rolling pretty good over the course of a day the level will fall (usually sometimes it goes up but not very often). If it is set good and I feed I lose the head and the level doesn't return to the original position. When I clean it I have to readjust the level as it usually goes too high. It's been around 2 months or so so I believe it is broken in.

Info: Plumbed via the upside down "U" (tank not drilled) and water level in this are stays stable. Return is about .5-1" above water in sump. Pump is a blueline 55 (pressure rated pump) with about 4ft head on it.

So is this just a product of the beckett? Anyone have any suggestions how to fix this issue? I really need to get it to be more stable if I ever want to take a vacation, no one else knows how to deal with it.

Thanks for any suggestions, tips, ect.

 

[drstupid]

check out the mrc club thread in this forum.

i found with my old mrc whenever starting it up i had to turn the air all the way off, then turn it on about a turn and a quarter, just enough to make it start to do something. let it sit for about ten minutes, then bring it up to it's final operating air level. for my mr1 that was about another turn, it'll be close to whereever you run it now. if you have dual injectors, you probably need to do this with both, i'd read up on it in the mrc club thread.

the "gentle start" let me get it set consistently and it would run at the same level for days or weeks even. the skimmer does require some attention, you can just use a (dedicated!) toothbrush to clean out the scum from the inside of the riser every couple of days instead of doing a thorough cleaning, i'd do this for a month at a time before doing a real cleaning and taking the cup completely off. taking the cup off and cleaning it always led to a day or two of trouble setting the level.

you need to be careful of junk getting stuck in the injector, monthly i'd break down the injector completely and clean it out. if you find yourself turning the air up more than you expect to get it to the right level, you should clean the injector just in case that's what's going on. if you get it set and then the junk frees itself up, you're asking for a flood (or a really wet skim if it's in your sump and not external). things like nori making their way down to the sump can clog the injector easily.

 

[Vauche]

Thanks Dr. and I don't think that was stupid at all!