Skimmer overflowing with excessive bubbles

[Nanook]

So, ever since I dosed Hydrogen Peroxide (14cc/day for 2 weeks) back in January, my skimmer has had excessive bubbles in the body causing it to overflow. I ran carbon, polyfilter and GFO all to no avail. I did a 40 gallon water change on my 120g tank a while back, but that didn't solve the problem either. So, I took the skimmer offline for a few months and hooked up a new one today. The new one is a beckett skimmer and it is overflowing excessively as well.

Any idea how to correct this problem?

[bnumair]

turn the dial on volume of water input low. lol for now till things settle down. happens to me when i use cyano meds in tanks. i just turn the dial down to where it doesnt overflow but still works so its gets rid of whatever is causing the issue. keep running Carbon, polyfilter, gfo.

i know of few methods to remove Hydrogen Peroxide from water but they are not reef safe. for example you can freeze the water 32F as HP freezes at 51F. skim the HP off the water. or use of manganese dioxide.

[Nanook]

Skimmer was all the way open months ago, didn't work:( I'm brewing up 80 gallons of fresh saltwater for a big water change in hopes that'll dilute whatever is causing my issues.

[Randy Holmes-Farley]

Seems pretty odd that it has continued. I can easily see how you might have killed organisms or irritated them into releasing organics when you added the peroxide, but that should have cleared up long before now.

Aside from things to get rid of remaining organics (water changes, more GAC, maybe Seachem Purigen), the options look like long shots. Maybe you shifted the bacteria profile in the tank to something that releases surfactants into the water as part of their normal growth. Or maybe something big was injured and continues to ooze organics. In either case, I'm not sure what you can easily do about it.

[bnumair]

Correction. HP freezes at 12.2F not 51F.

[Nanook]

Thanks to both of you, appreciate the help. I'll try the big water change and see what happens. I've never experienced an issue like this for as many months as it's been happening. I even tried running the skimmer in overflow mode for a long time thinking it might take everything out with time, but no such luck. I haven't tried the Purigen yet, but might give it a go...does that go in a filter cylinder?

[bnumair]

Purigen is like a grain of sugar size. It's best to place it in a media sock them place in high flow area.
On long shot you can also try cuprisorb. It removes Cooper for sure but many heavy metals as well.

[Randy Holmes-Farley]

Maybe you just coincidentally have a creature that is putting out a lot of surfactant.

Have you added anything recently?

[Nanook]

Maybe you just coincidentally have a creature that is putting out a lot of surfactant.

Have you added anything recently?

It's been happening since January. I started with 3 SPS frags, then 2 more, then 10 more, then 15 more:D All SPS and 180 pounds of live rock. The first issue was severe green hair algae which manual removal and snails cleaned up. Then there was a severe, and I do mean severe, case of dinoflagellates which I used the H2O2 for 14 days at 14cc/day. Lights were kept off for about 3 days and the dosing made the dinos vanish, then I started seeing some fuzzy algae growth a few weeks later.

[tmz]

Puzzling;usually skimmers are very good at removing surfactants which go to the air water interface; sometimes it can take a few days like when to much epoxy putty cures in the tank at once. Emptying the cup frequently is a big pain when that happens. Sounds like there is some on going supply of surfactant going on biological or otherwise.
How are the animals doing?

Any fumes in the air from household projects?

[Nanook]

Puzzling;usually skimmers are very good at removing surfactants which go to the air water interface; sometimes it can take a few days like when to much epoxy putty cures in the tank at once. Emptying the cup frequently is a big pain when that happens. Sounds like there is some on going supply of surfactant going on biological or otherwise.
How are the animals doing?

Any fumes in the air from household projects?

No fumes in the house. I have about 8-9 small fish. I've experienced the epoxy reaction before, but nothing this prolonged (months). Something might be producing it like Randy thought, or if I am lucky, it is residual gunk in the water and I just haven't done enough of a water change yet (I'm hoping).

[DavidinGA]

Restrict your air intake.

[tmz]

From what I can gather not all surfactants are equal in their affinity for air vs water. I might try drier skimming if you can to see if that helps.Might run both skimmers for awhile since you have them.