Needle wheel skimmer ?? Big bubbles

[Sinistard]

I have a needle wheel skimmer and am having trouble with it producing large bubbles and I am not getting any kind of foam head. From what I can tell there is no reason for the large bubbles and I am stumped on what to do.

The skimmer uses 2 gx-4100 pumps and is plumbed to take water in from my overflow. I can't find anything wrong with the set up or the pumps and was wondering if there is anything that could be in the water causing the large bubbles?

The tank has been set up for around 3 weeks now with LR and I did not get much of a cycle due to the fact that my LR was from an existing tank so my water is probably fairly clean but I still would expect the skimmer to produce something. I have a few snails and hermits but no real bio load in the tank yet.

If anyone has any ideas or suggestions as to things to test please let me know.

 

[BLockamon]

You will often get surging of water from the overflow, which will cause large bubbles in the skimmer. I assume you are also getting small bubbles as well from the pumps.

You can look in the Deltec USA forum for ways to hook up the overflow to minimize surging. That should help.

 

[Sinistard]

Thanks for the advice, I'll check out deltecs forum to see if I can find any fixes there.

I have turned off the pumps and just let water run into the skimmer and I did not get any bubbles from the overflow. Also the water level in the skimmer stayed very stable. I only watched the skimmer for a few minutes to check for bubbles but I let it run over night with the pumps off and every time I happened to look at it there were no bubbles. I will observe it for longer tonight

I am getting small bubbles from the pump but I am pretty sure the big bubbles are coming out of the pump as well. It's odd from everything I have been told and read this should not be happening. I was thinking it could be something in one of the pumps but both are doing it, if I run one at a time both produce big bubbles.

Thanks again for the ideas.

 

[BLockamon]

If the bigger bubbles are also coming from the pumps, it could be that air is leaking in somewhere other than the venturi. You might want to recheck the connections. Most likely on the suction side our you would be leaking water rather than sucking extra air.

May also want to check venturis for obstructions.

 

[tonyf]

Block' has a good point ... make a couple of turns of teflon tape on all threaded joints between the skimmer body and the pump. That'll sort out any air being sucked in through the threads.

Tone

 

[Yam]

I doubt its related to the overflow. I would check the pumps and make sure that the venturi/airlines are clear. One of the impellors may be broken/missing pins also.

 

[golfish]

try adding some kind of small valves to the ends of the venturi lines and tweek down the air intake a little. This might help.