@!#I$ Sump Seal Failure!

Wow, good thing I worked from home today because if not, I definitely would have came home tonight to find around 10 gallons of water on the floor and a burned up return pump.

Here's the story:

I just get off the phone to see my return pump spewing bubbles into the tank big time. I quickly open up the cabinets and see the return chamber empty and my ATO trying to fill it back up. Turn off the power, and identify the problem. One of the bottom seals on my 2 month old 10 gallon sump fails big time and is spilling water into my stand. I'm assuming at a rate of around 10GPH as it looked around the same rate as flow through my fuge.

The bottom of the stand is nowhere near waterproof and there is definitely a lot of water now sitting in the carpet. I'm guessing around a gallon or two. I can clean up the water outside of the stand but I'm sure there's quite a bit underneath where I cannot get to. So unfortunately, I think I'm going to need to break down the tank to clean it and avoid a stinky moldy carpet issue. The timing couldn't be worse however.

I'm leaving tomorrow after work for the weekend and need to get this done asap. And I might as well now, since half my stand is now empty.

I plan on shampooing carpet and let dry overnight.

The BreakDown:

I'm thinking about draining all the water into large tubs to hold the LR.
Q: Do the tubs need to be heated? Powerhead? Airstone??

My livestock is light and hoping should be okay in QT Tank
Q: 10 gal QT, currently has small firefish. Would it be okay w/ coral beauty, 2 clowns and bi-color blenny (If i can get him out of his rock) overnight and tomorrow in 10 gal?

Q:5 gal fuge w/ chaeto.. Thinking it should be okay for a day w/out heater Just keep it lit?

Q:Corals go in QT tank too..? Thankfully not many.. kenya tree frag, GSP frag, pulsing xenia and pom-pom frags, mushroom rock. I realize 10 Gal QT will be packed!

Any Suggestions??

For the record, Heres pics as of yesterday/today before the breakdown..

And things were just starting to look so good to








Today:



Faulty Sump

 

that blows sorry for your leak, but like you said it could have been worse you could have been gone...

 

Agreed, It definitely could have been much worse, and I'm thankful I caught it when I did.

I just hope I don't have to go through another cycle / algae outbreak as the tank will be without water for 24 hours or so...

 

you can get cyanoacrylate glue and an accelerator to fix the problem temporarily until you can silicone it make sure you get a thick glue so it won't run how big is the leak they make different types of this glue a thin style which id like water works great for sealing the plumbing i had a leak in my return line it took less than a minute and my tank was up and running and leak free

it could have been like this http://www.3reef.com/forums/show-off-your-fish-tanks/my-125-diary-updated-60731.html

 

That's a pretty good suggestion. At this point I think I'm going to eat the 12 or 15 dollars for a new 10 gallon tank instead of trying to fix the original.. perhaps this time I'll just put a bead of silicone around the joints and existing seals just as a precaution. the only thing I'll need to do is re-silicone the baffles into the new 10gal. Shouldn't be a big deal.. I'll give it a chance to cure overnight as the carpet is drying as well.. This way tomorrow I should be able to just get everything up and running again.. We'll see.

 

1. Yes all of those.
2. Yes just keep them heated and have an airstone in there, as well.
3. Why not put the cheato in the QT? I don't think it will pull through not being heated.
4. This will be fine, too

 

Mid Breakdown

I decided the QT would be best for the few corals I do have.. no copper a bit of flow and 0amm 0 nit 10-15 Nitrate.. I'm thinking about doing a 20% WC in the qt tank with 2 gallons of water from my DT.. As of yesterday all my dt levels were 0 except for 2 ppm nitrate.. Thoughts? Should I do more?

Mid breakdown:




I need to go get more buckets...:-/

 

I have quite a bit of chaeto.. If I just pull it all out and throw it in qt, there probably won't be much swimming breathing space left and it'll most likely get caught up in powerhead / filter.. .. should I get a little heater for it?

 

I had the same problem too. I know what you are going through. Since the suggestions have already been mentioned I want to add one more thing. When you rebuild your sump fuge, put down tarp in your stand this next time. If you ever have a leak, it won't compromise your stand or your carpet. Make sure you dry our stand out thoroughly with a hair drier or heat gun though, the last thing you want is wood rot to set in.

 

Great Idea, I'll be putting that down first thing tomorrow morning and drying the stand out..Lets hope the new 10gal tank holds up a bit longer than a couple months.. :