Accidentally Used Soap on Skimmer

[MaeganWink]

My mother thought she was helping when she was visiting my classroom today and washed my skimmer with soap while we were moving the tank it goes to. I've put it to soak in a half-and-half mixture of white vinegar and R/O water for now but...anything else I should be doing with it? Luckily the system has nothing in it right now and won't for a few weeks, but I'd hate to have lingering soap kill things introduced once we get it going again...

[DaJMasta]

I doubt it will be a huge problem, but if you wanted to test, you could run it for a bit in a bucket of RO and see if you get any bubbles rising up the column.  You could also try using some RO and dechlorinator like prime or similar to try to lock up any residual harmful metals or whatnot that could have been part of the detergent.

 

My understanding is basically that soap surrounds dirt particles to loosen and remove them, so with exposure to enough grime, a given quantity of soap will basically be used up and can just be removed as a rinse.  This probably isn't the case for all detergents, but I think that means with comprehensive rinsing it is likely to be fine again in time.

[AlanM]

I agree.  Just run it for a while in a bucket with some RO water and if it isn't foaming like crazy, then you should be fine.  You're right that you don't want to be putting surfactants into your reef tank.