Octo NW 150 - 2 mo. - Skimmateless

[BioFish]

I believe I have the 2008 model, no bubble plate or v-neck transition. Like the title says, 2 months plugged in with very minute skimmate. In the 2 months it has not produced enough skimmate to fill the collection cup (except once when my apartment was painted it overflowed). I read a lot of "it can take up to a month, just be patient" ... so that's what I did. Now I'm on month 2, have some nitrate problems, and really need some wet skimmate going on. I have tried moving the riser tube from just below the neck joint and up to the collection cup and everything in between. I was starting to believe my bioload was too low (5, 2" or less, fish), but nitrate problems are telling me my skimmer isn't working effeciently. Skimmer is sitting in 6-7 inches of water and can be lowered another 2-3 inches.

The skimmate in the cup is after 2 weeks of skimming....

[BioFish]

Anyone?

[cmacld]

where do you have the water line set in the neck of the skimmer?

[tkeracer619]

It looks like it is working fine just very dry. Make sure the air intake is clean then raise the stand pipe just a bit.

Have you done any mods to the pump? If not a mesh mod is in order. From the looks of your stand pipe you could put more air into it.

[TheH]

I have this same skimmer but with a gate-valve. It produces skimmate for me so I would definately consider an installation issue or perhaps a defective part.

This is for me after 2-3 days:


Definately not saying it's a high-performance skimmer but it should produce skimmate out of the box without modifications.

[BioFish]

The riser tube is the water level. I'm trying to get wet skim so I have the riser tube level with the collection cup.

No mods done to it yet. I've strongly considered doing the mesh mod, but held off because its a PITA to get it in and out of my sump

Thanks for the picture of yours. What size tank do you have?

[cmacld]

My riser tube is at the water level as well.. i get a real nasty skimate, i would say that it is dryer than wet, but it gets lots of the crap out for sure... i dont like it too wet cause i just have to empty it more often (although i see you have a drain).. and it seem to get a thicker more concentrated skimate this way.. man does it stink so good!!

[TheH]

I have it on a 90 gallon. One thing I was thinking about is that your cup is drilled for collection. I know that sometimes allowing too much air into the cup can cause problems (i.e. some skimmers don't perform as well with the lid removed).

[cmacld]

ahhh... another good point theH!!

[Chris27]

From the looks of the first picture, I would take a good look at the airline from the end that sucks in, all the way to the nozzle on the pump. Calcium and little snails do a fantastic job of blocking it. Also, those pumps aren't the most reliable, consider temporarily swapping it out with another one for troubleshooting purposes. The bottom of your skimmer should be chock full o' bubbles, where as in your skimmer you can see right to the bottom and even see where the water/bubble mix is coming right in - that would lead me to either an air problem or a pump problem.

[svynx]

You could also try raising the water level you have the skimmer in. It looks like you have it raised up with a plastic box. That way the pump isn't working as hard to push water.

[mcoomer]

I was thinking that the skimmer might be in too much water. A deep water level makes it harder for the pump to pull air in which will result in poor performance. Still, nothing in two months is worse than poor performance.

Mike

[RoscoPColtrane]

Where the airline venturi attaches to the pump intake you will see a small air intake hole that connects to the air hose. Make sure the rubber spacer is not blocking that small hole intake hole. Kind of hard to explain without a picture. Also the skimmer should perform best in 8-10 inches of water. Mine is in about 12 but does ok.

[BioFish]

I've tried googling other octo 150's to see if the bubbles are supposed to be any lower than the injection on my model and from what I can tell, they are where they are supposed to be. I lowered the skimmer body another 3 inches and am now getting wet skim like I wanted. Hopefully I will be able to get skimmate when running it drier. I had tried it in deeper water before but it was still breaking in so i really hadn't thought of trying that again. Fingers crossed!