My first test as a reefer....

by **blueshoes2208** » Wed Nov 26, 2008 6:35 pm

well i must say that water changes and maintenance for me were underrated.... i decided to clean out my fx5 today and came across a little bit of a problem.... i did not fully understand how the filter worked nor did i consult anyone on how to properly clean the filter media. If you are new to saltwater as I am please take note that a simple filter cleaning and perhaps 5 gal water change resulted into a 25-30 gal screw up and my carpet took the damage. I turned off the filter but only had one garbage back for backup if anything were to go wrong. I infact had the inlet hose come off the fx5 and that began to suck water out of my tank and throw it all over my room and at the same time had the inlet valve from the filter begin to push out massive amounts of water... i fixed the problem in approx 15-20 seconds but as you can see it takes no time to do damage. Please know what you are doing and have backup before you attempt something new.

One hour, 13 beach towels, 25-30 gallons of water, one freaked out mom, 2 reptile heat lamps and 2 segments of sportcenter later I had the filter taken care of and now I am about to do a major water change that , if done properly, should have been done 45 miinutes ago. Welcome to the reefing world....

by **TheCoralReef** » Wed Nov 26, 2008 7:11 pm

yea, i had a simalar problem months and months ago, i built my own sump with acrylic and didnt make it tall enough, the first night i had it...the power went out while i was sleeping! well the siphon overflow box kept working while my sump return wasnt, it overflowed my sump and i had a real mess 2 clean, and it did a number on the wood in my stand

by **fihsboy** » Thu Nov 27, 2008 3:57 am

Gotta love gravity and siphons. haha. Sorry to hear it man. But We all learn the hard way. I had no clue about siphons until I started my tank.......then the same thing happened to me. And damn it sucked. I feel your pain.

by **blueshoes2208** » Thu Nov 27, 2008 4:33 am

yeah...... the tank is okay tahts all that matters...... jus got alot of wet and salty carpet haha o well.....

by **nicholas542** » Thu Nov 27, 2008 4:39 am

I'm glad I got a pump driven overflow box. If something fails in my pump system it can't overflow that was one big reason I was scared to install a sump. I really didn't want niagra falls in my new house. The pond in the back yard is cool enough don't need one in my livingroom.

by **blueshoes2208** » Thu Nov 27, 2008 5:08 am

very smart.......

by **nicholas542** » Thu Nov 27, 2008 5:30 am

Yeah I made a big mistake with my skimmer skimate collection jar once. The hose that drained the main collection cup went into a collection jar. The jar had about two cups of nasty funk in it, and I kicked it over onto the white carpet once. My room smelled like a sewer for a couple days.

by **Snowboss4492** » Thu Nov 27, 2008 2:25 pm

ooooooooooooo nasty............lol - - - that sucked

blue, look on ebay for a rapids pro overflow box....or even go to foster and smith, and look for the rapids pro filter, you can buy just the overflow box and aqualifter pump

oh wait your running an FX-5 .....never mind lol - --sorry bout the mess, i did the same thing, i forgot to plug in the over flow pump and started the filter and the sump pumped empty into the tank and overflowed onto my wifes nice oak hard wood floors ..................i didn't get any that night ....lol

Boss

My first test as a reefer....

8 posts