My clown fish jumped into my overflow and clogged my return pump with a rock, and then systematically made the tank dirty. And when i put them all in bags to clean it, they escaped out the window with the help of a large seagull. It was terrible. Haven't had a tank since.
Ha! Today on BRS tv, where gonna talk about phosphates, and then what to do if there's a fish in the ocean ...looking for the one that's in your tank!!
Heard the glass "pop" on my 155g bow front. Went to see what the sound was and noticed the black trim around the top was cracked in all corners and the seal on the front glass had water inside of it. This was a week before we went on vacation..... Buddy had a 100g horse trough that I ran and got, drained water into it along with all my water change bins. Ran the reef inside the horse trough until I got the new tank setup that I found on craigslist that night. The tank wasnt ideal since it wasnt drilled and very dirty, but with my timing I had no choice. Had to drill it and spent hours cleaning it that night. Everything started around 2pm, had the old tank in the garage and the new tank in it's place waiting to be plumbed before I went to sleep that night. Huge disaster averted. I'm just glad it happened while I was home and not while we were on vacation. Tank was up and running 3 days before we had to leave. Luckily everything ran perfectly those 3 days so I wasnt too worried about stupid stuff while we were gone. The good that came out of it was the tank stand and canopy are furniture grade so the wife loves it. I also drilled and plumbed for a basement sump since I had the old tank out of the way and had the opportunity to.
A late Congratulations on your son! This video has been highly awakening for me. I have had a very successful reef tank for 15 yrs now and up until recently, free of coral eating pests. I am very frustrated at the lack of knowledge and help from my local reef store. Not having problems before with nudi’s or any other types of pests except aphasia I dont even know what to look for that may be the problem Thanks for sharing your knowledge!
I had two. The first one my heater stayed on and overheated the whole tank and cooked all the fish and coral. The second thing I had go wrong was I didn't realize the power of LED lights and I bleached all my coral The person at the Pet store told me that LED lights weren't too intense and should not hurt the coral at any setting. I did my research on them but I really felt that the person knew what they're talking about and believe them I'll never do that again. Thanks for all the videos I have learned so much about all aspects of a reef tank. Thanks!!!!
That's. Good tips. I'm new to saltwater tanks. Just past one month with my fish. And your channel has help me A LOT!!!! thank you !!! Sadly to say most Petco and pet-smart don't know a lot to really help me. I been to 5 stores around my area. And get some tips. But for the most part this channel and other RUclips channels have help me the most.
Do you guys have a video on how to upgrade your reef tank to a larger one? If not, a video on this topic would be awesome. Maybe that video could follow the end of the 52 weeks series. Something like "So you finished watching our 52 weeks of reefing series and want to upgrade your tank. Here's what you should know." Keep up the good work.
+BulkReefSupplyCom Excellent! I currently have a 36 gallon without a sump but I'm thinking of upgrading to a 120 with a sump, new rock and sand. I used wet live rock to start my 36 gallon but it came with hitchikers, such as small brittle stars and vermetid snails, that I don't want to introduce to the upgraded tank, so I won't be transferring that live rock to the new tank.
+BulkReefSupplyCom My questions on this process are: should I use the water from my current tank for the new tank (I know I will need to produce a lot more new saltwater to fill up the tank)? can I immediately transfer my livestock to the new tank after setting it up? do I have to cycle the tank before I transfer my livestock? (this could be an issue as I want to set up the new tank in the same spot where my current tank sits and cycling would mean moving my current tank to another spot without tearing it down while I wait for the new tank to cycle and operating two tanks for a month) I want to go with the safest and most recommended alternatives as I want to do the process right (even if it means more work at the beginning) to prevent problems later and related stress. I have learned so much from your channel. It's what has made me want to upgrade to implement a lot of the things I learned in your videos with a new tank (I've implemented what I can in the current tank).
+BulkReefSupplyCom It's a bummer you had to install the Apex on the 160. I really wanted to see you guys implement the cerebra in the tank to learn what its full capabilities are. But then again, keeping the 160 safe, comes first.
Great video again and welcome back. My only comment on this one regards the use of vinegar to offset alkalinity. You could be adding a large carbon source and depending how much you need, carefully handling diluted muriatic acid might be the better choice for the tank.
My second to worst disaster was when my DOS pumped everything from the DDR into the tank. Fortunately the DDR doesn't hold that much and I didn't have much left in it. The logs from the DOS really helped me figure out exactly what went wrong and helped Neptune diagnose the issue, which was a circuit board inside the DOS got moist. Keep that DOS dry! First worst was a 12 hour power outage. What was bad is that I used my computer's UPS to keep the tank going on life support instead of my basement sump. The dual marine batteries on that sump drained and the basement flooded. Now I have a whole home Generac. Well worth the investment in my opinion. I never have to worry about power when I'm away from the house.
Great video. My disaster was an increase in ammonia that went undetected and caused a tank crash. Only took a couple of days an everything went south fast. Lesson Learned!
I recently had an external protein skimmer dump about 5 gallons of water onto the floor resulting in my ato res being dumped into the tank. This all happened just after I went a way for the weekend. Thankfully my Mother Inlaw was able to stop by and clean up the water on the floor saving it and when we got home that night the salinity had only dropped 2 points so we were able to add saltwater to the ato for a couple days to bring it back up slowly. During that process we also complete moved the tank and found the stand was cracked. the system ran for a month with out the sump while a new custom stand was built and everything was moved again. We didn't loose any live stock at all and no major house damage. Just a vacation cut short and a new sump design for the new 90 gallon which adds the ATO res and the protein skimmer into the sump with the ability to allow extra water if there was an ATO issue to flow back into the ATO area meaning that all of the ATO res volume is captured with the sump no matter what happens. (No more water on the floor... Knock on wood)
Oh damn Ryan! That's the same exact thing I did a month ago except I left the calcium going. I left it running for approx 8 hours and the calcium was higher than balls on a giraffe. I added some alkalinity component to equalize the imbalance and BOOM!! precipitate storm. I did a couple big water changes and everything works out in the end.
Seal blew out on my 90g in wall reef tank. What a long couple days. Ended up moving everything to a stock tank in my basement plumbed into my sump. Took months to rebuild everything. I wish it upon no one.
Tank got a bit cloudy, and my dad was tank sitting. He thought since chlorine helped clear up the pool it would help clear up the tank......worst disaster ever. I try not to let reef "strangers" house sit anymore.
I had the side of my sump blow out completely. It was a DYI 40 gal breeder setup. I came home with a bag of new fish in my hand and noticed the display didn't look right. Went to the basement and it was flooded with an empty sump on the counter and a return pump blowing air. Luckily the sump was in the basement. But I now have an ALD from Neptune and BRS shipped me a Trigger Systems sump fast. This is a great video because this stuff will happen. And when it did BRS was just a phone call away and sent out what I needed fast.
I lost power for 3 days during a cold snap that brought down alot of trees. thankful I already had a generator so I was able to keep my refrigerator and critical systems running on my tank.
As always BRS comes up with sound advice on prevention of heartbreaking disasters..I'm moving towards full automation of my tanks keeping on hand everything you mentioned. This worst tank disaster I faced was the 6.3 North Ridge,Ca. Earthquake my 60 gallon fresh water tank was thrown from its stand along with everything else in the house,making a terrifying situation even more so..broken glass,all that water and sand plus the fish I couldn't save...it wasn't until i moved out of California that I got back into keeping aquariums in my home.
Late teens, was on vacation out of the country for 2 weeks with family. My brother was watching the house and he had a party and a drunk guest bounced off my reef tank and it shattered. luckily I had 6 rescue/holding tanks nearby so they salvaged the fish and some coral. He didn't tell us till we got home.
My power went out for almost 3 days in a snow storm. Temperature dropped and had to set up a temporary tank at my girlfriends house 10 mins away. I was successful saving my 2 clowns and watchman goby and also my brothers 2 clownfish. Sadly i could only focus on so many fish at once and had to leave 2 freshwater fish at home in the cold and they passed away. I need to find a solution to running a heater during a power outage. Also had a bearded dragon in a shoebox with hand warmers because his heat lamp stopped working when the power went out. Not a fun time!
i should get my one friend to post, the bottom just blew out on his 75g cichlid tank about a week or two ago, and he actually caught it on video as he was doing a youtube live stream of his tank. absolutely crazy.
Tank leak! Luckily we were at home (it woke us up before the leak detector kicked in) and we just went to it right away: pressure on the corner where the silicone had failed, cut the return pump, ATO and MP10 in "slow" mode to put as much water into the sump as possible. Then buckets and siphoning a bit more into the sump. At the same time, sponging all the water that had splashed around (about 3 gallons). This was on a very packed 25 gallon but we were able to save everything. Only a red dragon suffered a bit.
I usually rented a power generator for the power outages in the PNW but after renting it for 4 times I decided to just buy one (it would have paid itself already...). I've used it twice already so I'm happy with it! As far my worst disaster, Kalkwasser and ATO failures.... learned my lesson there! Do not trust any equipment, no matter how good of a brand that is, they can all fail! My Apex energy bar failed (normal wear and tear according to Neptune Systems after 3 years of use) so relying on the controller to turn off the ATO is not the only solution, you need additional backups in case the controller fails (yes, I know, hard to believe but they do fail horribly). I've switched over to two part using the DOS for my Apex, have a smaller ATO reservoir (I used to have a 32G brute trash can for my 125G reef, now I have a 15G with just RODI water, not kalk) I bought the tunze osmolator and I've redesigned my sump so that in case the ATO fails, all the water that it will dump will still fit into the sump without overflowing into my floors and only impacting my salinity very mildly. I'm still worried that the energy bar will fail on the heater so I got a new one (the one that you guys use) just in case and I will switch it every year. I got extra sensors for salinity, leak detection and PH so that as soon as I detect something wrong my wife and I will get emails and SMS that something is wrong.
Could put some warm water in a blender to mix the salt fast and pour it through a clean old pillowcase or some other fine cloth to filter the salt crystals that never dissolved instead of waiting for them to settle. In the higher powered blenders you can just put a bunch of salt mix in it and blend with no water to turn it into a fine powder which will make it mix faster and easier too but measurements will be off like a cup after turning it into powder would equal more salt than before because it's more compact.
300 gallon tank cracked and 2 1/2 years before that the seal seeped, i am well rounded to tank failures. i don's do glass tanks anymore only over built acrylic tanks now
Ryan, That is So Funny cause i just did the same thing and hadn't updated my notification on the controller..lol. I don't feel so bad now.. luckily i hadn't filed the dosing container so it auto shut off when empty
Out of all the tanks I have I put my smallest (10 gallon) in my brothers bedroom. Woke up to him tell me it's leaking at 5 am a few months later. It was dumping water about half of it was gone when I go to it. Lucky being a 10 Gallon I just picked it up and put it in a bathtub and the 1 fish that lived in it I put in another other tank. Got a new one the next day for about $15 at Walmart.
I had a tank leak a while back, that was a crazy night >.> but everything survived! I used the tub method I had corals in 1 tub fish in another and rocks in the third tub
Red slime in my 75 reef and 80+ degree water for over a week are probably the worst I've had. I fixed the hot water by using an 18" pedestal fan to blow air over the tank/under the lights. 6 t5HO lights heat up fast...
Had a brand new 6x3x3 foot tank crack the whole way along the base the first night I filled it up. Let's just say getting woken up at 2am to the sound of 1000litres of saltwater running through your house is not ideal. Fortunately there was only water in the tank as I had filled it to do a leak test so no gravel rock or livestock lost but the carpet in three rooms was destroyed.
Heater failed on me 10 yrs ago. Lost everything in my African Cichild tank with Wild Caught breeding colony. I've been running heater free ever since then on both my Reef tank and Fresh Water tanks.
Made an adjustment on my HOB Skimmer and then left shortly after that. Get a call from my wife when she got home saying the skimmer cup is overflowing fast and the power strip that sits under the tank was sparking and everything is off. Cant believe it didn't start a fire. Ironically this was less than a week ago.
I have had 3 disasters, the first was i broke my sump trying to remove a skimmer so i had to drain my tank and put everything into a 29, the 2nd was when i wanted to put a sump on that 29 so i drained it half way and started drilling and it turns out that the tank was tempered, the 3rd time was when my heater in my frag tank failed and roasted over $200 in corals
Oh and the cheap $20 car inverter may not work so well with AC pumps. Cheap ones tend to have a very crappy square wave output, which some pumps might not like (the inverter might be what goes kaput)
FYI, you skirted major disaster because you're using 2 part. I've had something similar to me happen with my controller *couNEPTUNEgh* stuck on the "ON" position and emptied two 1/2 to 3/4 full 5gallon buckets of 2 part into my 180g tank. Woke up and noticed a Christmas setting everywhere, only thing lost was a Solon wrasse and I think that had to do with him being in his nightly mucus cocoon. If you had a failure with a calcium reactor things would have been much worse. The precipitation is what saved you.
Hey Ryan, Is there some way you could do an if, then, else, flowchart to help everyone of us that doesnt have the long term experience of problem solving from a chemical standpoint in our reef tanks? This would be very helpful in an emergency situation, or is there someplace you could direct us to for that information? I know you have covered all of those things in this episode, but it would be helpful to have a hard copy on hand. Thanks for the great info in the 52 week series, it has been fantastic, keep up the great work cant wait until your able to ship to the Philippines. I will order all my equipment from BRS. Tom
Hi, BRS! Something really similar happened to my reef tank and I need a little bit of help. I accidentally dosed way too much and got that same awful precipitate. It would not come off so I had to drain my tank and use vinegar to clean it up. Unfortunately, I missed a few small places and it is really quite annoying when you look at the tank. I want to remove it, but do not want to drain my tank again. What can I do?
10g tank broke at the front and my juvenile trigger was left in about and 1-1/2" of water and i found my snowflake eel two bed rooms down the hall. thankfully i had 2 other tanks at the house so i was able to safe everything else But The Tank.
I had a couple of people fumigate my house a couple of months ago, and I didn't realize what it might do to my tank, and the fumigation completely wiped out my tank
Should liquid and live foods fall under the “quarantine all wet items going into the tank” umbrella? That is to say, how likely is it to find ich parasites (for example) in a bottle of live, commercially distributed “pods”?
Had a heater lock in the on position found at 90 degrees lost 70% of tank purchased apex soon after Had a pump short out blew power to whole tank no damage
Unrelated to this episode, I was wondering if there is a limit as to the number of fish, corals rock and other living creatures one can put in their tanks? Or is even is there a limit? I have a 55gal tank and currently have 35lbs of live rock, 5 fish, a carpet anemone, a frag of star polyps, a fire shrimp, emerald crab, and 5 snails. Can or should I add another fish? How many corals can I add?
as long as all the corals seem happy and healthy and there is no agression twords ome another you should be ok. people have tanks that are absolutely loaded with corals. I'd just take your time adding corals tho. I would add a few at a time just so everyone can adjust to the new tank inhabitants and you can get good readings on how much calcium alkalinity and magnesium is being consumed by your new corals
Worst tank disaster (other): Not realizing how out of whack my RO/DI unit filters were, kept topping off with "clean" water, keep doing good water changes like we're supposed to, couldn't understand why corals were just dying..
I had the same issue on my 10g. RO membrane went to crap and I purely relied on its supposed gallon lifespan instead of testing. I was going through DI resin like crazy but just chalked that up to our really bad city water in Plymouth, MN.
The membrane surely was suspect in some way, I put a TDS meter on the in and out, went from like 140 in to 35 out which didn't look right, new membranes brought that output number to 2. May have been the carbon that was out of whack too, I keep meaning to put on an actual flow meter to measure how much water goes through my pre-filters but never get around to it... probably the single easiest piece of equipment to get lazy with.
I don't think I've ever had to deal with any of this. The biggest panic I had was when I thought my seahorse was about to give birth and all the babies were going to be sucked into the sump and die. But then I learned that seahorses will often puff themselves up to be more attractive to their mate or to show off.
I am moving and feel like this is my current disaster. I am running zeovit and would love any advice you could give me. also if there is a zeovit product that would help fortify my corals for the stress of the move as well as help them recover from any damage that maybe incurred
well I lost 3 sps and a flaming angle :(, they were in tubes with air stones for 14 hours total. in 52 FAQ I would really like to see something on moving your tank. I thought I did everything right but I guess not :(
So today I did a 50% water change and well, realised after I almost finished filling it back up that I was using RO water not salt water. I quickly emptied 70% of water and lucky I had some extra salt water... So yeah, label your buckets lol
long story, only can have a 12.5" WIDE SUMP UNDER MY 55 GALLON, very hard to find a narrow sump, tried to buy a stock sump, broke three times in shipping, so now trying for a 30 gallon long because it has thicker glass!!
Hi Could you not use the Apex to control The BRS Dosing pumps? I Just ordered the Vertex Cerebral and want to order the BRS dosing pumps to be controlled by it. I'm now starting to worry that is not possible to do now... Please can you let me know if I could use the cerebral to control the BRS dosers with a probe monitor.
heater failed in the on position while I was camping. came home to a tank that was a 101. everything died except a joke tang and clown. the clown was actually jumping out of the water to cool off.
Ouch! Heater failures are all to common - most manufacturers use fairly cheap bimetal thermostats that tend to fail on the on position. A couple tips to prevent/limit the damage: Use 2 smaller heaters instead of a single big one. That way if only one fails it will raise the temp slower and it likely won't get as high. Also a controller like a ranco temp controller, or a full aquarium controller like an Apex is a great safety net. They are much better constructed and more reliable than the heater thermostats. Set the heater thermostats a couple degrees higher than the controller, so they serve as a backup to turn off the heaters just in case the controller should fail.
Vodka dosing works but I no longer dose, 2 accidents both completely my fault. I was lucky to catch it in time both times. Its so easy to get distracted, at least for me.
A bit embarrassing. The first time overdosed from the start , did not follow directions properly. I corrected dose no ill effects, nitrates did drop significantly . Second time I was testing my dosing pump for what should have been 15 seconds to make sure it was dosing the correct amount. I pulled out container from under dosing hose to measure got distracted and did not shut pump off. Later I noticed pump was still on did a 50% water change but this time had cloudy tank for a bit, bacterial bloom. After that figured maybe vodka dosing was not for me.
Rushing to work and knocked my fish food in to my tank without realising, got home everything dead luckily it was my small 20g fresh water not my reef tank now I put the fish food in the cupboard not on top of my wardrobe
I was electrocuted by a faulty wavemaker I had been in the sump the day before no prob then the next day as soon as my hand touched the water it was obvious something was wrong so I isolated each piece of equipment one by one until the problem was found as it turns out the wavemaker was the last thing I isolated so I was shocked multiple times but it had no effect on the fish or corals just wasn't pleasant for me
This prabably sounds stupid, but my hermit crabs had peraly whitr shells when i bought them, and now they are green with algae. Any way i can clean them?
Since this was the disaster upload :-) What is your input on grounding probes? Some say there will always be some volts in your tank & others say there shouldn't be? Then some say dnt ground your system as it can cause electrolysis & poison your fish without you know the reason till its toooo late? Do you guys have a volt reading in your tank currently. I CANT FIND A DEFINITE answer & i do trust you guys for some reason :-) EDIT: Sry if someone did already ask this Q. Thanks guys...
+BulkReefSupplyCom sadly most newbies aren't aware that they can do damage when they die. i think someone should make a video guide (hint) on tips for beginners and newbies to avoid these possible disasters. Such as carbon makes lights penetrate the water stronger, or if anemones die they can nuke your tank, or even certain palythoas can carry palytoxin and if not treated and fragged correctly you can end up in the hospital. You get the idea. It would be awesome to just refer newbies to a video where all of this can be found and explained without having to experience any of it and try to avoid it as much as possible. Most if not all new comers in this hobby have a lot of potential room for disaster in their tanks basically what your video is about. Something to think about 🤔 I always refer BRS videos to anyone who's new to the hobby.
This is cheating because it's to do with my old tropical freshwater tank. But being young an naïve, I had slightly overstocked a tank with platys and corydoras, I was getting away with it by using an aerator, but it failed, my fish could get any oxygen and 95% of them died. Heartbreak. But now that I have malawis, I understand that side of fish keeping now so it won't ever happen again 👌🏼
![I.N "HALLUCINATION" | [Stray Kids : SKZ-PLAYER]](http://i.ytimg.com/vi/n5B5q1Hwt_U/mqdefault.jpg)
My clown fish jumped into my overflow and clogged my return pump with a rock, and then systematically made the tank dirty. And when i put them all in bags to clean it, they escaped out the window with the help of a large seagull. It was terrible. Haven't had a tank since.
Ha! Today on BRS tv, where gonna talk about phosphates, and then what to do if there's a fish in the ocean ...looking for the one that's in your tank!!
@@zx45zx 💦😂
Lmaoo the first sentence alone had me thinking of Finding Nemo then everything else confirmed it 😂😂
Heard the glass "pop" on my 155g bow front. Went to see what the sound was and noticed the black trim around the top was cracked in all corners and the seal on the front glass had water inside of it. This was a week before we went on vacation.....
Buddy had a 100g horse trough that I ran and got, drained water into it along with all my water change bins. Ran the reef inside the horse trough until I got the new tank setup that I found on craigslist that night. The tank wasnt ideal since it wasnt drilled and very dirty, but with my timing I had no choice. Had to drill it and spent hours cleaning it that night. Everything started around 2pm, had the old tank in the garage and the new tank in it's place waiting to be plumbed before I went to sleep that night. Huge disaster averted. I'm just glad it happened while I was home and not while we were on vacation.
Tank was up and running 3 days before we had to leave. Luckily everything ran perfectly those 3 days so I wasnt too worried about stupid stuff while we were gone.
The good that came out of it was the tank stand and canopy are furniture grade so the wife loves it. I also drilled and plumbed for a basement sump since I had the old tank out of the way and had the opportunity to.
A late Congratulations on your son! This video has been highly awakening for me. I have had a very successful reef tank for 15 yrs now and up until recently, free of coral eating pests. I am very frustrated at the lack of knowledge and help from my local reef store. Not having problems before with nudi’s or any other types of pests except aphasia I dont even know what to look for that may be the problem Thanks for sharing your knowledge!
I had two. The first one my heater stayed on and overheated the whole tank and cooked all the fish and coral. The second thing I had go wrong was I didn't realize the power of LED lights and I bleached all my coral The person at the Pet store told me that LED lights weren't too intense and should not hurt the coral at any setting. I did my research on them but I really felt that the person knew what they're talking about and believe them I'll never do that again. Thanks for all the videos I have learned so much about all aspects of a reef tank.
Thanks!!!!
That's. Good tips. I'm new to saltwater tanks. Just past one month with my fish. And your channel has help me A LOT!!!! thank you !!! Sadly to say most Petco and pet-smart don't know a lot to really help me. I been to 5 stores around my area. And get some tips. But for the most part this channel and other RUclips channels have help me the most.
Do you guys have a video on how to upgrade your reef tank to a larger one? If not, a video on this topic would be awesome. Maybe that video could follow the end of the 52 weeks series. Something like "So you finished watching our 52 weeks of reefing series and want to upgrade your tank. Here's what you should know." Keep up the good work.
+BulkReefSupplyCom Excellent! I currently have a 36 gallon without a sump but I'm thinking of upgrading to a 120 with a sump, new rock and sand. I used wet live rock to start my 36 gallon but it came with hitchikers, such as small brittle stars and vermetid snails, that I don't want to introduce to the upgraded tank, so I won't be transferring that live rock to the new tank.
+BulkReefSupplyCom My questions on this process are: should I use the water from my current tank for the new tank (I know I will need to produce a lot more new saltwater to fill up the tank)? can I immediately transfer my livestock to the new tank after setting it up? do I have to cycle the tank before I transfer my livestock? (this could be an issue as I want to set up the new tank in the same spot where my current tank sits and cycling would mean moving my current tank to another spot without tearing it down while I wait for the new tank to cycle and operating two tanks for a month) I want to go with the safest and most recommended alternatives as I want to do the process right (even if it means more work at the beginning) to prevent problems later and related stress. I have learned so much from your channel. It's what has made me want to upgrade to implement a lot of the things I learned in your videos with a new tank (I've implemented what I can in the current tank).
+BulkReefSupplyCom It's a bummer you had to install the Apex on the 160. I really wanted to see you guys implement the cerebra in the tank to learn what its full capabilities are. But then again, keeping the 160 safe, comes first.
Cerebra has HORRIBLE reviews. Stick with what works best over time...APEX.
Great video again and welcome back. My only comment on this one regards the use of vinegar to offset alkalinity. You could be adding a large carbon source and depending how much you need, carefully handling diluted muriatic acid might be the better choice for the tank.
My second to worst disaster was when my DOS pumped everything from the DDR into the tank. Fortunately the DDR doesn't hold that much and I didn't have much left in it. The logs from the DOS really helped me figure out exactly what went wrong and helped Neptune diagnose the issue, which was a circuit board inside the DOS got moist. Keep that DOS dry! First worst was a 12 hour power outage. What was bad is that I used my computer's UPS to keep the tank going on life support instead of my basement sump. The dual marine batteries on that sump drained and the basement flooded. Now I have a whole home Generac. Well worth the investment in my opinion. I never have to worry about power when I'm away from the house.
Great video. My disaster was an increase in ammonia that went undetected and caused a tank crash. Only took a couple of days an everything went south fast. Lesson Learned!
Glad you averted disaster! This is motivation for setting up my apex system which has been sitting in the garage for 3 months...
Mine has too, its still in the box..
My heart sank when I saw the abridged notification on my phone of the new title!! glad it wasn't too catastrophic.
I recently had an external protein skimmer dump about 5 gallons of water onto the floor resulting in my ato res being dumped into the tank. This all happened just after I went a way for the weekend. Thankfully my Mother Inlaw was able to stop by and clean up the water on the floor saving it and when we got home that night the salinity had only dropped 2 points so we were able to add saltwater to the ato for a couple days to bring it back up slowly. During that process we also complete moved the tank and found the stand was cracked. the system ran for a month with out the sump while a new custom stand was built and everything was moved again. We didn't loose any live stock at all and no major house damage. Just a vacation cut short and a new sump design for the new 90 gallon which adds the ATO res and the protein skimmer into the sump with the ability to allow extra water if there was an ATO issue to flow back into the ATO area meaning that all of the ATO res volume is captured with the sump no matter what happens. (No more water on the floor... Knock on wood)
Yes it was a stock manufactured stand that was just not up for the task of a 60 gallon +30 gallon sump.
Love these vids! Watch em all the time during lunch!!
Oh damn Ryan! That's the same exact thing I did a month ago except I left the calcium going. I left it running for approx 8 hours and the calcium was higher than balls on a giraffe. I added some alkalinity component to equalize the imbalance and BOOM!! precipitate storm. I did a couple big water changes and everything works out in the end.
Seal blew out on my 90g in wall reef tank. What a long couple days. Ended up moving everything to a stock tank in my basement plumbed into my sump. Took months to rebuild everything. I wish it upon no one.
Tank got a bit cloudy, and my dad was tank sitting. He thought since chlorine helped clear up the pool it would help clear up the tank......worst disaster ever. I try not to let reef "strangers" house sit anymore.
unfortunately not able to on that one. It was pretty early in the tanks life, so not too much was lost.
Damn. Anyone that watches my tank needs a degree in marine biology! Or at least watched a few hours of BRS videos :)
Not to insult your dad but even an eleven year old can realize that chorine is bad for animals
I had the side of my sump blow out completely. It was a DYI 40 gal breeder setup. I came home with a bag of new fish in my hand and noticed the display didn't look right. Went to the basement and it was flooded with an empty sump on the counter and a return pump blowing air. Luckily the sump was in the basement. But I now have an ALD from Neptune and BRS shipped me a Trigger Systems sump fast. This is a great video because this stuff will happen. And when it did BRS was just a phone call away and sent out what I needed fast.
I lost power for 3 days during a cold snap that brought down alot of trees. thankful I already had a generator so I was able to keep my refrigerator and critical systems running on my tank.
As always BRS comes up with sound advice on prevention of heartbreaking disasters..I'm moving towards full automation of my tanks keeping on hand everything you mentioned.
This worst tank disaster I faced was the 6.3 North Ridge,Ca. Earthquake my 60 gallon fresh water tank was thrown from its stand along with everything else in the house,making a terrifying situation even more so..broken glass,all that water and sand plus the fish I couldn't save...it wasn't until i moved out of California that I got back into keeping aquariums in my home.
Late teens, was on vacation out of the country for 2 weeks with family. My brother was watching the house and he had a party and a drunk guest bounced off my reef tank and it shattered. luckily I had 6 rescue/holding tanks nearby so they salvaged the fish and some coral. He didn't tell us till we got home.
My power went out for almost 3 days in a snow storm. Temperature dropped and had to set up a temporary tank at my girlfriends house 10 mins away. I was successful saving my 2 clowns and watchman goby and also my brothers 2 clownfish. Sadly i could only focus on so many fish at once and had to leave 2 freshwater fish at home in the cold and they passed away. I need to find a solution to running a heater during a power outage. Also had a bearded dragon in a shoebox with hand warmers because his heat lamp stopped working when the power went out. Not a fun time!
i should get my one friend to post, the bottom just blew out on his 75g cichlid tank about a week or two ago, and he actually caught it on video as he was doing a youtube live stream of his tank. absolutely crazy.
I'm in san diego and MACNA will be here and is 2 weeks away..see you all there!
That picture of a 500 gallon blowing out is why I'm terrified of glass tanks...
Tank leak! Luckily we were at home (it woke us up before the leak detector kicked in) and we just went to it right away: pressure on the corner where the silicone had failed, cut the return pump, ATO and MP10 in "slow" mode to put as much water into the sump as possible. Then buckets and siphoning a bit more into the sump.
At the same time, sponging all the water that had splashed around (about 3 gallons).
This was on a very packed 25 gallon but we were able to save everything. Only a red dragon suffered a bit.
I've noticed you guys haven't brought up stray voltage and grounding probes/GFCI outlets.
A good video about stray voltage would be great, I think.
I usually rented a power generator for the power outages in the PNW but after renting it for 4 times I decided to just buy one (it would have paid itself already...). I've used it twice already so I'm happy with it!
As far my worst disaster, Kalkwasser and ATO failures.... learned my lesson there! Do not trust any equipment, no matter how good of a brand that is, they can all fail! My Apex energy bar failed (normal wear and tear according to Neptune Systems after 3 years of use) so relying on the controller to turn off the ATO is not the only solution, you need additional backups in case the controller fails (yes, I know, hard to believe but they do fail horribly). I've switched over to two part using the DOS for my Apex, have a smaller ATO reservoir (I used to have a 32G brute trash can for my 125G reef, now I have a 15G with just RODI water, not kalk) I bought the tunze osmolator and I've redesigned my sump so that in case the ATO fails, all the water that it will dump will still fit into the sump without overflowing into my floors and only impacting my salinity very mildly. I'm still worried that the energy bar will fail on the heater so I got a new one (the one that you guys use) just in case and I will switch it every year. I got extra sensors for salinity, leak detection and PH so that as soon as I detect something wrong my wife and I will get emails and SMS that something is wrong.
Could put some warm water in a blender to mix the salt fast and pour it through a clean old pillowcase or some other fine cloth to filter the salt crystals that never dissolved instead of waiting for them to settle. In the higher powered blenders you can just put a bunch of salt mix in it and blend with no water to turn it into a fine powder which will make it mix faster and easier too but measurements will be off like a cup after turning it into powder would equal more salt than before because it's more compact.
300 gallon tank cracked and 2 1/2 years before that the seal seeped, i am well rounded to tank failures. i don's do glass tanks anymore only over built acrylic tanks now
Love the series, mistakes happen and we learn from them! Ordered the new tank from you guys and should be receiving it next week. #BRS
+BulkReefSupplyCom Tell Randy thanks for all the help with tracking it down this week!
Ryan, That is So Funny cause i just did the same thing and hadn't updated my notification on the controller..lol. I don't feel so bad now.. luckily i hadn't filed the dosing container so it auto shut off when empty
Just imagine if there was a total tank crash! What would you guys have done? Marine Depot would have loved that...
Out of all the tanks I have I put my smallest (10 gallon) in my brothers bedroom. Woke up to him tell me it's leaking at 5 am a few months later. It was dumping water about half of it was gone when I go to it. Lucky being a 10 Gallon I just picked it up and put it in a bathtub and the 1 fish that lived in it I put in another other tank. Got a new one the next day for about $15 at Walmart.
I had a tank leak a while back, that was a crazy night >.> but everything survived! I used the tub method I had corals in 1 tub fish in another and rocks in the third tub
Welcome back!
Living in Florida and with tropical storm 9 on the way this weekend I wish I had of picked up my generator before now.
Red slime in my 75 reef and 80+ degree water for over a week are probably the worst I've had. I fixed the hot water by using an 18" pedestal fan to blow air over the tank/under the lights. 6 t5HO lights heat up fast...
Had a brand new 6x3x3 foot tank crack the whole way along the base the first night I filled it up. Let's just say getting woken up at 2am to the sound of 1000litres of saltwater running through your house is not ideal. Fortunately there was only water in the tank as I had filled it to do a leak test so no gravel rock or livestock lost but the carpet in three rooms was destroyed.
I had a water bridge fail between two tanks and a pump moving water from one to the other emptied about 10 gallons onto the floor.
Close call averted!
Question: Will a dip in Bayer Insect Killer kill vermetid snails?
It didn't kill the ones on my frags. so, nope.
Dos Maiz Damn, I need to figure out what will kill them then.
***** Alright, it's annoying that dips don't affect them!
Hey Ryan , Welcome back....was wondering if you could give a total amount invested on this tank and all that makes it work??
Heater failed on me 10 yrs ago. Lost everything in my African Cichild tank with Wild Caught breeding colony. I've been running heater free ever since then on both my Reef tank and Fresh Water tanks.
Made an adjustment on my HOB Skimmer and then left shortly after that. Get a call from my wife when she got home saying the skimmer cup is overflowing fast and the power strip that sits under the tank was sparking and everything is off. Cant believe it didn't start a fire. Ironically this was less than a week ago.
I did not....
I have had 3 disasters, the first was i broke my sump trying to remove a skimmer so i had to drain my tank and put everything into a 29, the 2nd was when i wanted to put a sump on that 29 so i drained it half way and started drilling and it turns out that the tank was tempered, the 3rd time was when my heater in my frag tank failed and roasted over $200 in corals
Oh and the cheap $20 car inverter may not work so well with AC pumps. Cheap ones tend to have a very crappy square wave output, which some pumps might not like (the inverter might be what goes kaput)
Power outage that caused 80+ gallons to spill on my floors a week after setting up my first tank
FYI, you skirted major disaster because you're using 2 part. I've had something similar to me happen with my controller *couNEPTUNEgh* stuck on the "ON" position and emptied two 1/2 to 3/4 full 5gallon buckets of 2 part into my 180g tank. Woke up and noticed a Christmas setting everywhere, only thing lost was a Solon wrasse and I think that had to do with him being in his nightly mucus cocoon. If you had a failure with a calcium reactor things would have been much worse. The precipitation is what saved you.
Love your channel. I have freshwater tanks, 20,55,75,150, planted etc. I've always wanted to get into reefing. hmm.....
Reef tanks = knowledge, (lots of knowledge) money and time. And a spouse that approves lol
Hey Ryan, Is there some way you could do an if, then, else, flowchart to help everyone of us that doesnt have the long term experience of problem solving from a chemical standpoint in our reef tanks? This would be very helpful in an emergency situation, or is there someplace you could direct us to for that information? I know you have covered all of those things in this episode, but it would be helpful to have a hard copy on hand.
Thanks for the great info in the 52 week series, it has been fantastic, keep up the great work cant wait until your able to ship to the Philippines. I will order all my equipment from BRS.
Tom
Hi, BRS! Something really similar happened to my reef tank and I need a little bit of help. I accidentally dosed way too much and got that same awful precipitate. It would not come off so I had to drain my tank and use vinegar to clean it up. Unfortunately, I missed a few small places and it is really quite annoying when you look at the tank. I want to remove it, but do not want to drain my tank again. What can I do?
10g tank broke at the front and my juvenile trigger was left in about and 1-1/2" of water and i found my snowflake eel two bed rooms down the hall. thankfully i had 2 other tanks at the house so i was able to safe everything else But The Tank.
I had a couple of people fumigate my house a couple of months ago, and I didn't realize what it might do to my tank, and the fumigation completely wiped out my tank
Should liquid and live foods fall under the “quarantine all wet items going into the tank” umbrella? That is to say, how likely is it to find ich parasites (for example) in a bottle of live, commercially distributed “pods”?
they nice never seen them before
Had a heater lock in the on position found at 90 degrees lost 70% of tank purchased apex soon after
Had a pump short out blew power to whole tank no damage
Unrelated to this episode, I was wondering if there is a limit as to the number of fish, corals rock and other living creatures one can put in their tanks? Or is even is there a limit? I have a 55gal tank and currently have 35lbs of live rock, 5 fish, a carpet anemone, a frag of star polyps, a fire shrimp, emerald crab, and 5 snails. Can or should I add another fish? How many corals can I add?
as long as all the corals seem happy and healthy and there is no agression twords ome another you should be ok. people have tanks that are absolutely loaded with corals. I'd just take your time adding corals tho. I would add a few at a time just so everyone can adjust to the new tank inhabitants and you can get good readings on how much calcium alkalinity and magnesium is being consumed by your new corals
Worst tank disaster (other): Not realizing how out of whack my RO/DI unit filters were, kept topping off with "clean" water, keep doing good water changes like we're supposed to, couldn't understand why corals were just dying..
I had the same issue on my 10g. RO membrane went to crap and I purely relied on its supposed gallon lifespan instead of testing. I was going through DI resin like crazy but just chalked that up to our really bad city water in Plymouth, MN.
The membrane surely was suspect in some way, I put a TDS meter on the in and out, went from like 140 in to 35 out which didn't look right, new membranes brought that output number to 2. May have been the carbon that was out of whack too, I keep meaning to put on an actual flow meter to measure how much water goes through my pre-filters but never get around to it... probably the single easiest piece of equipment to get lazy with.
Happens to everyone. Thanks for sharing. On a side note. Gmail for work can fix your spam problems. No need to change email.
I don't think I've ever had to deal with any of this. The biggest panic I had was when I thought my seahorse was about to give birth and all the babies were going to be sucked into the sump and die. But then I learned that seahorses will often puff themselves up to be more attractive to their mate or to show off.
do you think one kessil a360 is good enough for the innovative marine 40 gallon nuvo nano ? or maybe two a160s?
Great now im paranoid my tank is going to explode.
Be honest, Ryan. If it was anyone else who was responsible - "Ya fired!"
Ryan what are the 2 white black spot fish at 3mins 0 seconds hovering over the sand . look like a kind of mandorin
They are Twin Spot Gobies.
Think I'll get myself a pair of them
They are pretty cool. We had a couple in our tank for a while. I really like gobies, they have so much personality.
Explosive sump leak, ruined my carpet but lucky all livestock survived.
I am moving and feel like this is my current disaster. I am running zeovit and would love any advice you could give me. also if there is a zeovit product that would help fortify my corals for the stress of the move as well as help them recover from any damage that maybe incurred
I did purchase various beneficial micro fauna, will this affect them?
well I lost 3 sps and a flaming angle :(, they were in tubes with air stones for 14 hours total.
in 52 FAQ I would really like to see something on moving your tank. I thought I did everything right but I guess not :(
So today I did a 50% water change and well, realised after I almost finished filling it back up that I was using RO water not salt water. I quickly emptied 70% of water and lucky I had some extra salt water... So yeah, label your buckets lol
What water changer is that you used in the video?
thanks
Do u guys carry a tank like this and this size ? Rimless 160-180 gallon?
Glass sump broke twice, 10 and 20 gallon long!!
long story, only can have a 12.5" WIDE SUMP UNDER MY 55 GALLON, very hard to find a narrow sump, tried to buy a stock sump, broke three times in shipping, so now trying for a 30 gallon long because it has thicker glass!!
What are the fish at 2:53 the pair
Hi Could you not use the Apex to control The BRS Dosing pumps?
I Just ordered the Vertex Cerebral and want to order the BRS dosing pumps to be controlled by it. I'm now starting to worry that is not possible to do now...
Please can you let me know if I could use the cerebral to control the BRS dosers with a probe monitor.
also do you know if there are any customs restrictions on taking 2 part on a plane from the US to the UK?
hey I have 3 reactors do I still need to dose
What are the two fish in the bottom right at 2:5?
I believe those are Two Spot Gobie www.liveaquaria.com/product/prod_display.cfm?c=15+2124+216&pcatid=216
I dip in dettol!!! 0.3 ml per litre 😋
heater failed in the on position while I was camping. came home to a tank that was a 101. everything died except a joke tang and clown. the clown was actually jumping out of the water to cool off.
kole tang
Ouch! Heater failures are all to common - most manufacturers use fairly cheap bimetal thermostats that tend to fail on the on position. A couple tips to prevent/limit the damage: Use 2 smaller heaters instead of a single big one. That way if only one fails it will raise the temp slower and it likely won't get as high. Also a controller like a ranco temp controller, or a full aquarium controller like an Apex is a great safety net. They are much better constructed and more reliable than the heater thermostats. Set the heater thermostats a couple degrees higher than the controller, so they serve as a backup to turn off the heaters just in case the controller should fail.
Urggggg, only 2 weeks left :(
Vodka dosing works but I no longer dose, 2 accidents both completely my fault. I was lucky to catch it in time both times. Its so easy to get distracted, at least for me.
A bit embarrassing. The first time overdosed from the start , did not follow directions properly. I corrected dose no ill effects, nitrates did drop significantly . Second time I was testing my dosing pump for what should have been 15 seconds to make sure it was dosing the correct amount. I pulled out container from under dosing hose to measure got distracted and did not shut pump off. Later I noticed pump was still on did a 50% water change but this time had cloudy tank for a bit, bacterial bloom. After that figured maybe vodka dosing was not for me.
Rushing to work and knocked my fish food in to my tank without realising, got home everything dead luckily it was my small 20g fresh water not my reef tank now I put the fish food in the cupboard not on top of my wardrobe
I was electrocuted by a faulty wavemaker I had been in the sump the day before no prob then the next day as soon as my hand touched the water it was obvious something was wrong so I isolated each piece of equipment one by one until the problem was found as it turns out the wavemaker was the last thing I isolated so I was shocked multiple times but it had no effect on the fish or corals just wasn't pleasant for me
This prabably sounds stupid, but my hermit crabs had peraly whitr shells when i bought them, and now they are green with algae. Any way i can clean them?
Brush the shell with a toothbrush.
get new shells
Congratulations with your son
No problem
Trip of breaker a little magic smoke and a minor shock or 2
in the netherlands we almost never Have outage :-)
Lol ryan your very late bro it happend to me already had a doser pump put 5 gal of kalk in my tank
Since this was the disaster upload :-)
What is your input on grounding probes? Some say there will always be some volts in your tank & others say there shouldn't be?
Then some say dnt ground your system as it can cause electrolysis & poison your fish without you know the reason till its toooo late?
Do you guys have a volt reading in your tank currently. I CANT FIND A DEFINITE answer & i do trust you guys for some reason :-)
EDIT: Sry if someone did already ask this Q.
Thanks guys...
Is there an acceptable amount of voltage for a tank? I measured 48v in my 100l (30gal) system..
My new tank had a huge bacteria bloom. Killed my 2 clown fish!
Should of stuck with a CaRX ;-)
Anemone being sucked into a power head and nuking my bio cube 😪
+BulkReefSupplyCom sadly most newbies aren't aware that they can do damage when they die. i think someone should make a video guide (hint) on tips for beginners and newbies to avoid these possible disasters. Such as carbon makes lights penetrate the water stronger, or if anemones die they can nuke your tank, or even certain palythoas can carry palytoxin and if not treated and fragged correctly you can end up in the hospital. You get the idea. It would be awesome to just refer newbies to a video where all of this can be found and explained without having to experience any of it and try to avoid it as much as possible. Most if not all new comers in this hobby have a lot of potential room for disaster in their tanks basically what your video is about. Something to think about 🤔 I always refer BRS videos to anyone who's new to the hobby.
A mouth fungus that ravaged my African chiclid tank
LMFAO OG Mudbone I haven't heard that name in a while
should have gone salt
This is cheating because it's to do with my old tropical freshwater tank. But being young an naïve, I had slightly overstocked a tank with platys and corydoras, I was getting away with it by using an aerator, but it failed, my fish could get any oxygen and 95% of them died. Heartbreak. But now that I have malawis, I understand that side of fish keeping now so it won't ever happen again 👌🏼
One light fell into the water during night and all the livestock died electrocuted. It seems funny, but It was very sad.
i dropped PVC primer in my tank. Within a day, everything was dead.
Yes i did. But i wasnt able to get it all out. I had to break my tank down and now its been up for 3 months
flatworms thousands and thousands of flatworms and red slime to
Velvet that is all (hate velvet we have a bad relationship)
My anemone exploded and killed everything in my tank
Lesson learned: reef tank or kids. Pick one.
Reef Tank
So dose by hand..