holy sh$t i almost burnt the house down

reefwars · #1 09-12-2010, 09:57 PM

i am so ****ed i want to toss it across the room, the culprit was my hob aquaclear started a leak through the back

some glad i listened to you guys and never ran my tank off one powerbar the second back up was prob the only thing keeping everything alive when i got home. the only thing in the burned powerbar was a powerhead and aquaclear the lights heater and other powerhead was on a seperate power bar

thank god

Megalodon · #2 09-12-2010, 10:26 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by reefwars

i am so ****ed i want to toss it across the room, the culprit was my hob aquaclear started a leak through the back

Did the water drip on the GFI power bar? Shouldn't it have tripped? What brand was it?

reefwars · #3 09-12-2010, 10:49 PM

im not sure i can only assume it did drip on the bar when i got home water was all on the floor and wall.the powerbar is old and doesnt have any writing on it anymore it is a gfi but im thinking something isnt working on it???and it did trip it was tripped when i got home i had thought it burned so hot the bar shut off but it works fine when i plug it in now??? i wish i knew more im still piecing it together.

Llamarama · #4 09-12-2010, 10:51 PM

wow glad everything's sort of okay...glad you didn't burn the house down! hope the tank and fishies are ok

Wayne · #5 09-12-2010, 11:02 PM

Oh wow! That is certainly one of the great fears when having an aquarium. I always worry when I have power bar plugged into power bar plugged into timer which powers ANOTHER power bar

.

Glad that you go lucky! Hope the water damage wasn't too bad.

DiverDude · #6 09-13-2010, 09:21 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by reefwars

im not sure i can only assume it did drip on the bar ...

Not to rub salt in the wound but it shouldn't be possible for water to drip on your electricals. Always mount powerbars on a vertical surface (or even upside down) and make a drip loop with the cord !

reefwars · #7 09-13-2010, 09:40 PM

Diverdude out of several powerbars running four tanks this was the only one on the floor directly in back and under filter complete stupidity on my behalf

Murphys law

StirCrazy · #8 09-12-2010, 11:07 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Megalodon

Did the water drip on the GFI power bar? Shouldn't it have tripped? What brand was it?

it would only trip if the drip created a short to ground. if it was between the hot and common then no trip.

Steve

reefwars · #9 09-12-2010, 11:19 PM

Yeah there was no drip it was about 2gallons I estimate my tank was full when I left this morn it's a 33g tank there was about an inch to two inches missing from tank when I got home my own dumb fault though every other bar in the house every one lol screwd on the wall this one on the floor.....murphys law my friends

reefermadness · #10 09-13-2010, 12:33 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by StirCrazy

it would only trip if the drip created a short to ground. if it was between the hot and common then no trip.

Steve

Certainly when a powerbar gets wet current will leak to ground. Any ground fault and the GFI trips in 5ms.

The problem could be that he used a GFCI power bar and not a GFCI recepticle. The power bar triped sure but the outlet feeding the powerbar is still going hence if the power bar is really wet and there is still power to the powerbar, this could cause a fire potentially.