Neptune Aquatics

how quickly can I go from freshmixed sw to waterchange?

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sfsuphysics

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had a bit of an incident involving a heater, I dunno I guess too much of it got exposed, it cracked fell into the sump for an unknown period of time, didn't realize it until about 9:30 when I smelled that "expensive smell" upstairs, couldn't figure out what it was for a while but noticed my tank smelled funny, looked into the sump and there I saw half a heater sparking like crazy.

Well I got the metal coils out and ran a magnet inside the sump to see if there was anything else. Tank looks a bit icky a tad cloudy, some of the corals look like they're barfing guts out (lps), skimmer is going absolutely apeshit, when its all I can do to barely keep it from overflowing, I'm tempted to turn it off but I'm sure I need as much skimmingness as possible now. Fish look pissed/upset.

So yeah, I got 20 gallons of freshwater or so and am trying to mix up some fresh salt water for a water change, but I don't know how much a 10% water change is really going to do, but I'll see. Doubt I'll sleep much tonight though, so that's the good thing I can keep an eye on things, periodically empty the skimmer cup as it fills up, that sort of thing.
 
Mike I would say in a pinch you could just do the best you can in mixing it up and fire away. Probably way better then waiting in this situation.
 
Please tell me this is not on your SPS tank :(.. Good luck Mike... Hope things are just upset...
Sorry, I don't know the answer to your question. I always mix the water at least 24 hours.
 
I have used new saltwater mix 30-60 min after its been mixed with a powerhead. Add carbon to the tank and poly filter if you got it.
 
Yeah Phong, it's the SPS tank, I wouldn't care as much if it was the softy tank.

Bryan, thanks for the offer, I'm just going to wait until the water is clear (enough), test the sG and let fire. I might be over reacting mind you as well.

Looking at the graphs it looks like it occurred right around the time I smelled the "expensive smells" as I have a major spike in pH (well ok half a point), that dropped back to normal around the time I unplugged everything (glad I didn't stick my hand in the tank!). So if anything it didn't last that long.
 
Can you buy some more water? Store are closed but you can buy RO drink water at the vending machine. 20G is really not enough for that tank. Plus you have to replace the water the skimmer remove..
 
It's possible I guess to buy water from the store, although I'd not really feel very comfortable around here at midnight :D Plus if 20g isn't enough, will 40g be enough? 60? There's no real way for me to move that much water effectively. If it got really desperate I guess I could pull water from the soft tank and swap it out, but I don't want to pop too tanks.

I'll do the 20g as soon as it warms up a bit, and one thing I got is a TON of carbon, unfortunately only thing I have to put it in is a filter sock :D So I'll do the water change, run the carbon all night, and well see where I am 5-6 hours from now. (around when I'll be waking up and feeling really tired)
 
Well just looked with my actinic and blue t5 bulbs and most all my sps are faded pretty badly it seems the bright orange cap, looks a very faded pink, I'll have a 30g water change ready in a couple hours. So we'll see where we go from here.
 
Ok, I got a plan because I still can smell that "metallic" smell in the water. Basically do a 100% water change, when AC opens up later I'll swing by and get as much water as I need, clean out that pond liner I have, pull all the corals and fish out of the tank, basically giving it a 100% water change.

The upside is I don't have to deal with what ever is doing what it's doing in the water, and I don't have to do a series of water changes to try to dilute the problem, the down side is the fresh SW mixed up might be a bit of a shock to some already stressed and bleached out corals, and of course I'll never get my aquascape back the way it was :(
 
Oh man, I am sorry to hear that!
I have about 25g SW ready to go and 50g of RO/DI water if that could help you at all. Unfortunately I am at work in Hayward now and live in Redwood City but if you want to do another water change tomorrow or so I can get about 40g of SW ready and 50g of RO/DI.
 
Are you sure that metallic smell is in the water or maybe is just the smell is in the air?

cant a hight quality gfo remove whatever metal residue is left?
 
Thanks for the help Aldie, think I'm just going to buy the stuff from the store around noon or so (earliest I can probably get off work), and hope Chris has some containers he'll let me borrow to transfer the water over.


Cuda: Not sure if it's air or not, I do smell it right off the water surface and in the air still, but I would have thought the smell would have dissipated over night with fans running down there. Either way, my corals are bleached out big time and I think a move is necessary. I don't have any GFO handy, I do have carbon and I'm running that like crazy, trying to skim as much as I can as well. But I think I'm going to go with plan b of 100% water change (i.e. moving the corals to a temporary, temporary tank).
 
I'm really tempted to use tap water and a bunch of dechlorinator instead of RO/DI water too... yeah there will be quite a bit of TDS, but it's gotta be better than the alternative.
 
I've pumped water in still cloudy during water changes quite often.

Right now the most important thing to do is get a Poly Filter in there pronto, of course do a large water change, I wouldn't do more than half myself.

FWIW, I've had heaters break before and just tossed a Poly Filter in and been fine.
 
Phong, I make it with my RO/DI unit :D

Ok, I think I'm going to ditch the plan of moving everything over to a temp/temp tank. The acans are no longer barfing guts, in fact all the LPS in that tank seem quite plump. However ALL of the SPS in there are seriously bleached out, and also I don't see any with polyp extensions. I'll just continue to do water changes, keep running the carbon and skimmer, probably do a much reduced photoperiod on the halides as well if not off all together, and see where it takes me.
 
Jeremy, thanks for the advice, I'll get some polyfilters later unfortunately the earliest it looks like is around noon I'll be able to get them (I'm letting my students go way early today), in the mean time carbon will have to do the trick, as they're not something I have handy. Hope Chris has polyfilters... hope Chris is there and not one of his workers who might not know what polyfilters are!

I'll try to keep the water changes rolling over, unfortunately my RO unit can only make so much water :D.
 
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