No luck tonight--major tank leak!

[wbrodeur]

Was out starting to celebrate my recent master's graduation in Boston w/ coworkers when my mom frantically calls me. "There's water everywhere on the ground in your appartment!" Fortunately she noticed it when she went over to feed our dogs and cats and fish. Being a commuter to good old Norton, I was helplessly stuck in Boston till the next commuter rail train. Poor mom tried following my directions of reef talk. I frantically called Frank from here to ask what to do. Took all my corals and put to bottom of tank. I finally got home around 8pm to about a little less that half of water in a 55g long tank (its 1 am now and I'm still working on the tank). Fortunatly I have a great friend who had a 55g sitting around her house so she brought that over. I moved most of all the sand to the new tank and most of the rocks and most of the water. I had one 5g bucket of pre made salt water, so put that in there. Put all my corals and fish into a 10g tank w/ just the old water from tank because there is not enough water in the new tank for them to go in there and everything is super stired up.

How long can the corals and fish be in the 10g w/out skimmer, live rock, live sand...only heater and air? I plan on aquascaping the new tank and making new salt water, but will that cycle, I"ll be stirring up the sand bed again? When is it safe to put the corals and fish back in the new tank? Any advice would be much appreciated. Not really sure what the next step is. Ah, just my luck...keeping my fingers crossed that everything survives!

Oh yeah and the ceiling below our floor has to be totally replaced. Thank goodness our landlords are my parents! So not only did I have to fix the tank and totally switch the tank, but now I am working on peeling down the drop ceiling below us and hoping that the leather couches aren't too saturated and doing a water change to my fresh water tank that just so happened to be right under the spill...salt water got into my fresh water tank. Will post pics tomorrow and keep updated!!!!!!!!!!

 

[wbrodeur]

Lots of four letter words going through my head. Question, we lost a lot of live sand due to the transfer and it is extremely old. Would it be a good time now to add new sand? If so, what kind is the best kind? Does it need to be live, or will my live rock and remaining live sand be enough?

Thanks so much for any advice!!

 

[Takara]

depending on the ratio, the old sand should seed the new sand

I'd add it now, so is it back to a stable setup?

 

[JayM]

Wendy....sorry to hear. If you need RODI, shoot me a PM.

The livestock should be OK in your 10g for now with heat and circulation.

Keep your LR in water if you can. Plan on running carbon and skimming wet.

If you need to add sand, it is OK, just rinse the heck out of it before adding it.

GO SLOW, take a deep breath; your reef will be OK.

Oh, and congrats on your Master's.

 

[wbrodeur]

I don't have enough water in the tank yet to skim. Still in the process of making some. Thanks for the congrats and offers of help! It's great knowing there are people here to genuinely help out! I think I will add some new sand then...seems like my list of to dos that I"ve been meaning to do for months will get all done this weekend lol.

What sand brand is best from home depot? Also, I'll be aquascaping the rocks tonight, should I wait till everything settles and put in the corals and fish tomorrow or right after I aquascape?

Thanks all!

 

[mchartier]

Im not far in Rehoboth, I have a Brute can full of RO/DI if you need it.

 

[frank180reef]

HI Wendy
Any update? How are things going?
Frank

 

[wbrodeur]

So far corals and fish seem OK, just not happy being in a 10g w/out lights or rocks or anything to hide in. I just put new sand in the tank. What a huge difference in looks it makes and so fine. The sand I had was coarse and brownish. Now i'm just letting it settle a bit, going to sea creatures to pick up more salt. and aquascaping tonight. I hope to put in fish and corals tomorrow, just got to check the levels.

Thanks all for your offers of help!! Thanks Matt for your offer. I should be alright...been making water all night and day. Did I mention I didn't sleep lol. I'll post pics later when I get a breather.

Thanks all again!!

 

[RayD]

With the fish and coral you list on your sig you'll be fine. Softies and LPS are pretty tough and can hang in there. Delicate SPS might be a problem.

Best of luck with the transition. I'm kind of far away but if you're in a jam I have 55 gallons of both RO/DI and Saltwater made and ready to go. If you need any advice or need any kind of help that I can offer, feel free to ask away.

Seems like you're doing everything right and I think you'll be fine. Even if you do experience a nitrogen cycle which I doubt you will it will be small at best and your livestock will survive it.

At the end of the day you'll look back on it and be happy with the new scaping and sand. Sucks for now but you'll be happy at the end of it all.

PM me if you need anything.

_________________________________________________

 

[Jennifer]

I hope everything goes smoothly for you.

Bummer about the leak, But glad you got a handle on it.

 

[wbrodeur]

Update on tank leak

So far everything is looking good. Just started to attach corals to rock tonight. I'm actually very very please w/ the rock work, thanks to my awesome aquascaping pro husband and the new white sand bed! Besides be destroying the ceiling below the tank, this wasn't so bad fortunately. Now hopefully I'm better prepared. Thanks all for your help and suggestions and best wishes!!! First pic of the tank before, second is how I came home to it, third is some of the damage to the ceiling...it got worse later in the night, last pic is it now! The water is murky because the skimmer is going crazy w/ the epoxy. This aquascaping alows for much more corals!!

 

[Bobbofin]

At least you recovered. Good that your downstairs neighbors are your parents. Good luck on the repairs. This is everyone's worse nightmare!

 

[snowmaker]

You keep your parents in the basement? I hope you let them out once in a while...

I'd say you came through all this well. Lucky to have suspended ceiling down there as is about 10x easier to replace than sheetrock or plaster.
Was the tank very old? Do you think there was a lot of weight on that canopy, and could this have attributed to it's failure?

 

[emabie]

Looks great now. Nice to see you were able to turn this around.

Snowmaker makes a good point about to much weight on the tank. That canopy looks heavy plus the lights and all the extra stuff ontop. Do you know where the leak was? Are you sure it was the tank and not something plumbed to it or something else? It would be good to find out exactly what leaked and if possible why so you don't have a repeat.

 

[Jeff.:P]

Great Job! I just went through the same thing with a 55g. Luckily I noticed my stand was damp in the corner, and had enough time to make enough water, buy a new tank for the change over. Good luck.

 

[wbrodeur]

I *think* the main damage point was the fact that the tank was half on the rug and half off (second picture). I was told that that causes torque in the tank. So probably that uneven floor and heavy wait and 3+ years of it just was asking for it. So needless to say, there is no more rug under it and not a lot of weight on the canopy!