[Brighteyes_13]

lol, not concerned about flawless... the skimmer will skim when there's something to skim. however i am concerned that it goes from acting like there's nothing there to overflowing within seconds. What would cause that besides a major change in the water or setup?

The skimmer has been running in the tank for 2 and a bit weeks. It sits in 7.5" of water. I didnt have any instructions included with it when i got it but from what i can find online its best at 9.8" of water. If anything it should be running dryer, not wetter.
When i first fired it up i left it totally open (max flow min skim). there was silt in the water that it was helping pull out. over the first 5 days or so i emptied it of silty settlings i think twice. During week 2 i noticed my bubble level was sitting significantly lower in the chamber so i adjusted it a little bit per day. By Monday night it was at min flow max skim and the bubbles were still just barely coming up to the top of the cone/bottom of the neck. I was fine that it wasn't collecting. its a new tank like you mentioned and there's minimal algae in the water column or oils from feeding or bioload. I did want to make sure that if any started i would be on top of it.

What i am trying to understand is why it flipped on me in a matter of literal seconds. Id like to prevent from happening like that again. Id hate to have real skimmate reintroduced to the tank from an overflowing cup for some ridiculous reason that i didn't think of.