Is my skimmer broken...

[CEverii]

Ok so Ive had my reef octopus skimmer for about 3 months now. So it SHOULD be broken in. However unless my sump is filled up to the red line showed below, it will not produce any overflow into the cup:

It makes froth, just never reached the cup. To me that doesnt make any sence because i've seen skimmers in MUCH shallower water and be able to skim no problem.

On my skimmer I have this little pole that you can adjust up and down (shown in blue below). However, its not a tight fit inside the chamber. Its very wiggly and when I try to pull it up a bit, i feel like its going to slide right back down:

So what am I doing wrong?

 

[mr_X]

first of all i believe 8-10 inches is how deep these skimmers are supposed to be submerged.
secondly, if i'm not mistaken, you turn that pole, you don't slide it up or down. at least it's this way on the larger models.

 

[ccCapt]

Is the skimmer in a section of the sump where the water level never drops from evaporation? As Doug said, they should be run in 8"-10" of water and that level should never change.

 

[neilanh]

And you're right, that pole is how you adjust the water level inside the skimmer, although as stated above you want the skimmer to sit in 8-10" of water. By adjusting that pole up and down is how you set how wet or dry it skims. If you're collecting nothing in the cup, then you need to raise that pole up quite a bit.

 

[CEverii]

Is the skimmer in a section of the sump where the water level never drops from evaporation? As Doug said, they should be run in 8"-10" of water and that level should never change.

Because i use a rubbermaid bin as my sump, the water level in it is the same everywhere. I'm about to make a new sump tomorrow because I get my new stand tomorrow. How should i design this one so my sump chamber is always the same water level?

 

[mr_X]

you need to partition it from the return pump. make at least 2 chambers in the sump.

 

[CEverii]

Ah I see, Thanks a lot