Maintaining Your Overflow Box

Tonight I noticed that the water in my tank was much higher than it should be. It was starting to submerge the cross brace. My Hofer Gurgle Buster had gotten clogged with some big chunks o algae. This caused the water level to rise in the overflow box which caused the level to rise in the tank. The water level had not yet reached the hole on top of the gurgle buster which is there to start a siphon and quickly lower the level if it ever gets submerged.

I pulled the Gurgle Buster out and cleaned it but the level didn't drain quickly. The reduced flow had caused some extra bubbles to accumulate in the siphon tube and reduced flow. So, I spent some time cleaning the algae out of the tube. I really need to get a flexible brush because using paper towels is a pain in the arse.

I cut some pipe off the Gurgle Buster to lower the level that the siphon action will start if it ever gets clogged again. everything is running again and working normally.

My salinity dropped from 1.025 to 1.024 during all of this because the elevated level in the tank dropped the level in my sump which allowed more RO in to maintain the level. I'll just let the salinity rise again to 1.025 as the water evaporates. Everything should be fine.

Since the tank consumed so much RO water during this the container got close to being emptied. This would have halted the rise of water in the display tank. Had I plumbed an RO unit directly into my sump for a totally automated top off system I could have had a flood. Requiring some extra maintenance may be a good thing after all. From now on the Gurgle Buster and siphon tube will get cleaned during water changes every two weeks.