what will an overflowing skimmer do?

[sillygoose]

We went out of town for five days and had our son take of the tank. I asked him to check the skimmer everyday and empty as needed. Well, when I talked to him on our way home, he said the skimmer wasn't full so I told him I would deal with it when I got home in a couple of hours. When I got home, the skimmer was quite full. This morning when I check the pH it was between 7.4 and 7.6 :eek1:. It dawned on me that he may have misunderstood what I meant by "full" skimmer. It may have been overflowing for several days. Could this have spiked my pH?

I've started to raise the pH with additives and will do a water change after work later today.

 

[oscarslr]

what do you use to keep alk in check? Calcium reactor? Two part? I don't think the skimmer would affect PH just water quality in regards to nitrates and ammonia.

 

[sillygoose]

We are trying to get some ongoing pH issues sorted out with regulating temperature and alk and Mg. Before we left town, Michael told us that our temp was too high and that we needed more surface agitation. A small fan across the top of the tank has helped with both. He also said that alk would benefit from more surface agitation and thus provide better buffering. He also suggested adding Mg.

I was pretty horrified to check my pH and find it so low when I got back.

Horrors - I haven't checked NO3 or NH3. I'm goofing around at the office (instead of working) so I will check those as soon as I get home.

 

[aquaph8]

I dont know if you've read this or not but if not check it out. This article will help solve your PH problems and give you an idea of how to fix it.
CLICK HERE

Hope this helps, good luck.

 

[brettinteriors]

Whats the size of tank and sg? I am not aware of a protein skimmer overflow having any affect on ph. Mine did it twice this week due to a pinched venturi tube(just figured this out this am)! Do you check you alk/kh, if not it is probably too low and thats why your ph is off. I RARELY check ph, only alk. I have found that water changes are number one, a good a/b is number two, and I use an additional superbuffer dkh other than the b is necessarily if I am behind on my changes. I went away for 10 days on vacation and when I returned my plate coral looked wrong(now dead). My kh/alk dropped to 7. I find the supper buffers to do a better job of quickly raising alk. To me a good alk 10-12 means ph stability. Water changes are the easiest way to fix problems. Really we strive to keep the water parameters like the water we use to do the water changes. If we did enough water changes we wouldn't need to add anything. This is all my opinion and if I am wrong please chime in.