BIG Tiny Air Bubble Problem In Water

[jrittz]

I am using AquaClear 802 powerheads with an emporer 400 wet/dry and a prizm deluxe protein skimmer. I constantly have tiny air bubbles in the tank and they appear to always come from the powerheads. The powerheads constantly have bursts of hundreds/thousands of miniscule bubbles every so often but very frequently. I will tap the powerheads and more will come out. Does anybody know why this happens and how to fix it?
This problem is annoying, for one it is not healthy for the fish and two, the tank looks like crap with tiny bubbles floating around all the time. The tank is never clear unless I turn the powerheads off.
I have the addon to those powerheads that looks like a black cylinder with the white insert filter, though, I have taken the filters out. The purpose of these is to prevent a fish from getting stuck in the intake of the powerhead.
Hopefully someone has seen this before and has a solution.
Any and all input is welcome.
Thanks,
Jrittz

 

[thomas712]

Sucking air or cavitating or both. Pull the impeller and clean with vinegar, including the area where you pull the impeller from. If none of that works buy MaxiJets.
Thomas

 

[aarone]

Do you have the venturi valve on the powerhead? It will be a tube the site outside of the tank. These are specifically used to draw in air to the aquarium.
aaron

 

[jrittz]

Nope, not using the tube to inject air into the powerhead flow. I neglected to install those tubes because I knew it would be a bad idea.
I'll try cleaning those parts with vinegar. Not that this cant or wont work but I just do not see where the air bubbles are coming from.
Thanks for the input so far,
Jrittz

 

[jrittz]

Here's my old intake setup. This was connected to my AquaClear 802 to dissipate the inflow of water.

 

[jrittz]

This is the new intake system I purchased and implemented tonight to hopefully resolve the air bubble problem.