Broken heater -> Tank Crash in Progress

Albertan22 · #1 12-08-2012, 04:58 PM

Wow that's an awesome offer, thanks man. I think I'm ok with water for now, my next batch should be ready in a couple of hours but I'll definately keep your offer in mind. I'm basically running my RODI nonstop now that I'm home and just cycling it into my top-off jugs while I've got the salt mixing in the water change tub.

I'm hoping that I can still save most of the coral. My acros haven't started RTNing yet and my LPS and clam all look pretty happy. Some of the zoos have opened up since the last water change so that's encouraging. I'm thinking that I'm going to have to trim the birds nest down to a large frag size and hope for the best with it though.

BlueTang<3 · #2 12-08-2012, 05:01 PM

Yeah hope it works out for you, let me know if you need tubs or water or anything we are close by.

ScubaSteve · #3 12-08-2012, 05:12 PM

I've had this happen before. You'll probably come out all right.

Birdsnests RTN at the drop of a hat and usually they're the ones that set the other colonies off. I know it sucks but frag off any good remaining chunks of the birdsnest and get rid of it before all your other colonies follow suit. The BN grows like a weed anyways, so it'll be back to full glory in not too long.

Albertan22 · #4 12-10-2012, 01:02 AM

I think everything is going to be ok. A few waterchanges and running carbon for 3 days seems to have done the trick. Everything is opened back up again and looking happy. I cut my birdsnest back a bit to get rid of most of the exposed skeleton areas that RTNed. It seems the only real casualty was a cleaner shrimp, an unknown number of my CUC, and of course the heater that cracked. I think I'll be looking at replacing my glass heaters with something that's all plastic if I can find something.

BlueTang<3 · #5 12-10-2012, 01:19 AM

Go with titanium heaters gonna cost u more but they last longer I find and are usually bomb proof

kien · #6 12-10-2012, 01:29 AM

Wow sorry to hear man! We need heaters but sometimes heaters suck. Had a heater stick on me once and pretty much boiled my tank over night :-(. Those glass heaters scare the crap out of me. I know thousands of people use them but when I had them I always felt uneasy with the glass on glass clanking sounds.

mike31154 · #7 12-10-2012, 02:15 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Albertan22

I think everything is going to be ok. A few waterchanges and running carbon for 3 days seems to have done the trick. Everything is opened back up again and looking happy. I cut my birdsnest back a bit to get rid of most of the exposed skeleton areas that RTNed. It seems the only real casualty was a cleaner shrimp, an unknown number of my CUC, and of course the heater that cracked. I think I'll be looking at replacing my glass heaters with something that's all plastic if I can find something.

Good to hear you're more or less out of the woods with minimal losses. Not sure plastic heaters are the answer either if you're contemplating that. There were some issues with those exploding as well. I have one of each at the moment, an exploding plastic one (that hasn't exploded, thankfully) and a glass one. At least I can tell when the glass one is actually hot due to the indicator light. The plastic one I never know unless I grab it.

kien · #8 12-10-2012, 02:56 AM

I think I've solved my stuck heater potential by putting them all on the controller. It cuts them out when the tank gets a certain temp. So I guess for all I know any one of my 3 current heaters could be stuck ON, but I wouldn't know unless I took them off the controller and plugged them in independently somewhere?

Midway · #9 12-11-2012, 03:53 AM

I had a heater it went hay wired on me once too. It took a few corals out but the system recovered pretty good. I'm with Kien on this one, Have the heaters controlled by controllers...priceless big piece of mind. If heater gets stuck, controller shut it off at the temp you set yourself when setup heater on the controller. If the heater/s for some odd reason fail to turn on, there's go an email to your email account saying the low temp you set up yourself too has been reached so you can react right away. I know controllers are not cheap but they paid them selves big time saving you money and big time head aches in the future.