OH NO! Discussion: Have you ever had a tank emergency?

K

Keith

Premium Member
Greetings all!

In preparation for our July meeting we want to know if you've ever had a "tank emergency". It has happened to me. And frankly, to just about everyone I've talked to! So this is a chance to tell your story(s) and learn from others. This can be about the various ways you've flooded your house, had things go bad in the tank, or even about how you dealt with your tank during a "big" emergency.

In order to keep it easy to read copy this format into your post and fill it out:

  • <li>Category (brief, like "flood", "livestock issue", "failed AC in the house", or whatever):
    <li>The Problem:
    <li>What I did at the time to fix it:
    <li>What I would do differently if it happened again:

It's a great chance to learn and share your experience with others to help them avoid the same problems. Try to be concise. If you documented it, briefly describe it here and please link to your post about the situation.

If you find you have a story, or if you just want to try to avoid having one, you should come to the meeting on July 10, 2013. It's called "Tank 911! Emergency Preparedness For Your Aquarium, And Other Things You May Love, Like Some Of Your Family". You can find all the details here: http://www.dfwmas.org/Forums/viewtopic.php?f=6&t=111191

Thanks for contributing - and for carrying on!

Keith
 
Flood/tank failure:

Problem: I purchased a brand new Nuvo 24 factory direct around 60 days ago. I had read numerous threads about Nuvo tank's being damaged in shipping and more than a couple about tanks cracking when full. I have owned saltwater aquariums since 2005 and have never had one crack when full, so I got cocky and ordered it. Filled it up a month ago, cycled and added live stock yesterday. I guess the fish gods saw it fit to test me, because at 02:00a I heard a loud glass POP. I immediately drew my off duty weapon fearing the worst, until I heard water gushing and realized the situation was worse than an intruder. I went into the living room and was greeted with a waterfall coming from the large crack in my new tank. I luckily had 3 5 gallon buckets right next to the tank from my live stock transfer (and hours ago my GF said "put those gross buckets away" HA! ). before I touched the tank I stood there and took the scene in, whats important first.

1) electricity. Power was cut to the entire wall.
2) damage to property
3) life of the fish (one clown I have had since 2007)
4) saving corals.

I began siphoning water from the tank into buckets, this quickly slowed the water exiting the tank and reduced the pressure on the crack. While I did this, I scooped the fish out and placed them into the 5 gallon bucket that was filling. I did the same in another bucket with the inverts. towels were thrown on the ground and furniture was moved. all in all I got around 10 gallons of water on the floor so this was minor crisis but if I was not home or it was a larger tank, it would have been nasty.

done differently: I had the tank perfectly level but no foam padding under it. Mainly because nuvo stands come with a platform it sits on already. I also should't have bought the tank, I read the reviews (mostly positive) and found more quality issues than any other AIO tank. We will see how Nuvo honors its warranty, and I will report that. All is well now, and I think a simple AGA is in my future.

around 16:00 hours July 4th.
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02:00 July 5th
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Thanks for the kind words.
 
<u>Floods (first tank): </u>
1. Snails in HOB overflow U-tube (added screens)
2. Bulkhead not tightened properly
3. Left RO/DI container on floor while RO/DI was running and forgot about it
4. Skimmer overflowed due to collection cup located at edge of sump so it overflowed out of the sump
5. Skimmer overflowed due to making adjustment before going to sleep (different skimmer that was also located next to edge of sump . . . again)
6. Return pump died, flooded undersized sump.
7. Return line located too low with clogged anti-siphon hole, sump overflowed (ordered larger sump from Marc)
8. Siphon hose came out of bucket/trash can/whatever other container it was supposed to go into
9. Left hose to re-fill tank in sump without securing. Water pressure from Mag12 made hose come out.
10. Hose fitting not clamped to return pump. Hose came off at some point = in-house saltwater fountain.

<u>Floods (current tank):</u>
1. Dosing tube got clogged, generated too much back pressure, and tube came off at dosing pump end.
2. Dosing tube came out of sump, dosed a week's work of Alk onto stand
3. Filter sock touching edge of sump, wicked out 3 gallons
4. RO/DI line touching edge of sink when I forgot to turn it off while filling a tall water jug. Left it on overnight and water wicked down the line, onto to floor, under the wall, through into a bedroom and hallway.

<u>The Problem: </u>
Usually me

<u>What I did at the time to fix it:</u>
Grab lots of towels and hide the mistake . . . usually to no avail.

<u>What I would do differently if it happened again:</u>
Grab more towels and run faster.

<u>Other emergencies I've helped others with:</u>
1. Loaned out return pumps
2. Home AC goes out = loaned out spare chiller and window AC unit (multiple times)
 
@Mike wrote:
<u>The Problem: </u> Usually me said:
And the winner of the "Most Likely to Discover All Possible Ways To Get Water Out of a Tank" award is... Mike!
@Mike wrote:
<u>Other emergencies I've helped others with:</u> 1. Loaned out return pumps 2. Home AC goes out = loaned out spare chiller and window AC unit (multiple times) said:
Mike also takes home an award for being a perfect example of why we are called a Marine Aquarium "Society". Thank you, Mike!

Looking forward to seeing everyone at the meeting tonight!
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Click to expand...
 
The solution to no more floors full of water was to install a new sump that could hold all of the water when the power went out. I did discover it is a good practice to glue all of the fittings and connections that transfer water prior to starting up the system. Although it does make it easier to make changes to the plumbing later. So much for no more water on the floors. The solution to my problems is NOT ME!
 
The Problem: AC to the house went out over the weekend, temp rised to about 83-84 and steadily climbing...

What I did at the time to fix it: grabbed a couple of water bottles and threw them in the freezer, stuck one in the back chamber of the tank. They kept the tank steadily at about 81-82 but only lasts about 2 hours or so.

What I would do differently if it happened again: Threw more water bottles in the freezer or get a chiller or a fan that sits on top of the tank.
 
When my 280g was running, if there was a major power outage, I'd run my generator (there's a generator in tonight's raffle!!! so don't miss the meeting, y'all) to power the fishroom. The fishroom had a dedicated A/C unit. Even though my house was getting miserably hot, I was able to go into the fishroom and feel some cool relief. The tank was completely safe and unaffected by the lack of current in our neighborhood.
 
@bettalover wrote:
The Problem: AC to the house went out over the weekend said:
Here in Texas it's one of the biggest issues we face - heat. Marc's dedicated window unit to the fish room is a great idea and a way to have redundant AC. And they are pretty inexpensive starting at just over $100 (and I bet you can find them discounted in the off-season!). I live in a small condo divided into an upstairs and downstairs. And because the place was built back when you got paid by the number of AC units installed (apparently!), I have one small system for downstairs, and another for upstairs. I recently had my hot water heater explode and when the water mitigation people set up the dehumidifier downstairs it generated so much heat that my downstairs AC couldn't keep up, even running 24x7. So I took one of their floor fan and attached some plastic ducting tube (think like a sheet of plastic but in a tube about 1.5' in diameter) to it with duct tape. Then I put the fan upstairs and run the tube down stairs where it added the cool air from upstairs to the downstairs. Worked like magic! You could use the same idea to move air from a window unit right to your tank.

@Marc wrote:
(there's a generator in tonight's raffle!!! so don't miss the meeting said:
Yes there is! Along with lots of other amazing and wonderful things. I'm telling you, this is one you don't want to miss... :) Oh, and there's free stuff too!
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Click to expand...
 
Problem: AC failure while being 1200 miles away

Last summer I was visiting family in Va. Around 10:30 Dallas time, my email began to blow up with my Apex telling me the Tanks were heating. I called my house sitter and had him take the RO/DI bottles I had frozen and place them in the sump. The temps fail to within reason and the AC was restored in a few ours.

The apex is what saved the tank. Had I not had that, the tanks would have crashed over night. Always have redundancy and backup plans! And a good fish/house sitter helps too.

Problem: floods

I left my RO/DI making up some water. I had this hooked up in the guest room. I forgot to set a timer and was filing a 5gal water jug. Well, the GF decided she wanted lunch so we left. (Mind you it takes 45min to fill a jug). Well, we return 4 hours later and I go about my business of messing with the pool and what not when out of nowhere I hear the shriek and scream of a angry girlfriend. Needless to say, there was 2 inches of water in the bathroom and guest room. Whoops.... grab towels, mop and a beer and get to cleaning!!! Turned faces on the floor and cleaned it all up!! (Luckily I have zero carpet in my home).

Fix: now I use the bathtubs for all my makeup water except saltwater, that one had a float switch!!
 
Yesterday's microburst hit my area pretty hard, knocking out power to homes, street lights and traffic lights. No-one knew how to share the road, and the stupid railroad crossing bars were down creating more backed up traffic for hundreds of cars trying to navigate these streets. I got the generator running, feeding power to my reef, my tv, my computer and my router. I called to report the outage, and a recording said power would be restored by 9:30pm. At 8:20pm things came back to life, but I waited about 15 minutes to make sure they would stay on. I shut off the gas line on the generator to let it use up the last of the gasoline, which is very important (otherwise it gums up the line and obstructs the flow to the point the generator won't start next time). I got all the cords rolled up, stored the generator and came back inside. Before I could sit down, the power went out again, and I was in disbelief. So aggravating.

15 minutes later, I pulled out the generator once more and strung the power cords to all the same spots all over again. I also plugged in my fishroom's A/C unit to provide some cool air in the livingroom. Figuring the power would come on soon since they'd originally predicted 9:30pm, I waited it out. Around 11pm, I called Oncor and the recording told me power would be restored by 5:30am. I was nearly out of gasoline, and the generator was locked up with a cable to my vehicle. It would have been a hassle to disconnect everything and store the generator for a quick trip to the local gas station, so I asked my neighbor if he would be willing to do a gas run for me. Kindly, he did it on the spot. I gave him $40 cash and two gas cans that hold 8-gallons of gas, and upon his return I filled up the generator with about 5-gallons. It must have been nearly empty. It ran all night, and I stayed awake editing pictures and posting an article to the front page of Reef Addicts. Finally at 6am, the power came back on, I rolled everything up and plugged all the cords in their normal sockets.

Very glad I've always got a generator on hand. The only reason I didn't have extra gasoline was because it had been awhile since I'd had to use it, and had dumped some of that aging gas into my vehicle and used some for the lawnmower, and hadn't refilled the jugs. This storm took me completely by surprise, it wasn't like I'd ignored any warning signs.
 
Last year my 2 biggest disasters happened. The first one happened when I spent a week in the hospital dealing with Galbladder issue. My tank at the time was 35g hex with HOB skimmer. I normally feed the tank half a cube of frozen every other day. My family taking care of the house was feeding whole cube every day. The excess food caused my skimmer to go crazy at which it over filled. Having not known about proper drip loops, I didn't have them on my power cords. The excess skim shorted the wall outlet and tripped the breakers when no one was around. Total fish loss.

My second disaster happen when I was experimenting with biopellets. I didn't know you can't add all of them at once. I got a frantic call from my wife at work that my tank was crashing. Through instruction, she was able to get air hose into a power head for aeration till I could make it home. I lost almost all the fish. Later I found out that I cause massive bacteria bloom which used up all the oxygen in the water which suffocated the fish.
 
2007 leak in bottom seal of the 230 gal. By the time we got home from work half the water was out of the tank. what the water level going down didn't kill the MHs fried. The smell of baked leather is not soon forgotten! Only things I saved was the 2 maroon clowns and few mushrooms.
Bought a 50gal Walmart special and tossed as much as I could into it. Gave the tank away, sold all LR and MH lights and walked away from the hobby. I figured when the clowns died the 50 gal would go as well.

2012 husband told me to stop working 80+ hours a week and get back into my hobby before the stress killed me. So started the search for a "safe" clown/anemone tank.

Must haves:
1) big sump that can handle power failure
2) 2 overflows incase the first clogs and from pilot error when adjusting flow from tank to sump
3) All pumps/powerheads, etc. behind overflow to protect the anemones
4) tank length to provide tangs "sailing" room.
5) Auto top-off

Purchased Max S650 which fit all the needs. Purchased chiller, RO/DI.

Errors and fixes:
1) hose came off the pump while doing a water change and shot water to the ceiling - now use a bucket with lid to "limit" damage if hose comes off again (and we know it will)
2) forgot RO/DI while making new water and 2-3 gals on the floor - placed jugs in tub to catch "ooops" and set a timer
3) husband turned off timer (thought it was for the outside water) and tub had a crack. 2 gals water on floor - threatened to kill anyone turning off my timer and purchased new tub

Next purchase:
1) Wire house for dedicated fish circuit
2) Controller.
 
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