Tank poisons

[RobertG]

I dont know if this did happen, but what do you think about a piece of metal in tank. Maybe a 1/4 " wire piece fell into tank after I cut it back from a resistor. Like I said I dont know if this happen, do you think it could poison my tank. It is not copper, it is whatever a resistor lead is made of. Some type of silver metal. Ahh this is bothersome for me!!! I could not see it in tank. I cut it & it flew somewhere. Where I hav'nt found!

[GeorgeH]

Use a magnet to see if you can find it. I wouldn't think that it would be extremely harmful but you never know. Better safe that a tank loss!!

[RobertG]

Does anyone know what the resistor ends are made of? I dont, the resistor itself is magnetic however the ends are not. So the magnet trick unfortunetly wont work.

[SBreef]

Depends upon the resistor type. Generally resistors are made frm carbon, the leads are generally copper, coated with solder, pre-tinned!
Just a word of warning to all out there, "DO NOT" strip any wire "above anything that you are working on. I have seen too many problems that this causes.

[RobertG]

Pre tinned, Do you think this is going to cause any problems ?

[SBreef]

The "Tin" of the lead is from solder. Electronics solder is 60% tin and 40% lead. If I were you, I would be searching for it! But then again, you may never find it! I do not have any experience with a problem such as yours RobertG. Yes, there is still the issue of the copper wire, ask for more opions.

Roy
acclaim96

[RobertG]

Other opinions Please.

[jimcroce21]

You may want to try Dr. Randy Holmes-Farley over on RC. He seems to be the resident expert on reef chemistry.

[Instar]

Tin, Lead and Copper are extremely toxic in very small concentrations- BUT - It will take some time to go into solution and at normal pH for your tank, most of it will end up as precipitated, stabile solids and encrusted or absorbed by life forms that make it both insoluable and non-toxic so long as your pH doesn't go below 7.8 or above 10 in the case of copper. It will take a while to dissolve. My bet is that you will never know it happened. If it worries you, then why not just siphon all the sand out of that area if you know where it fell, strain it, and put it back in? The tinning itself is quite stabile. The copper at the end is hardly exposed. You could take a similar piece and drop it into a small vessell of tank water with live sand and see how long it takes to degrade, if it does and test that water for copper. This will give you some idea of how soluable a wire like that is. Then calculate the volume in your small vessell against your tank to see how long it might take to reach a testable level in the tank, if ever it does. Of course, failing some very sophisiticated equipment or expesive tests from a reference lab, you will not be able to test for led or tin until its already too late. Consider that there can be a lot of these contaminates in the fish food and salt mix already, so, I doubt you will ever notice such a small piece in a 240 gallon tank so long as the tank is maintained like it should be. Then again, how many threads and how much trace of contaminates are in a bag of sand is unknown. I know there is some much of the time.

[RobertG]

Thanks Larry, as far as water volume I have just under 300G. I dont know for sure if it went into the tank, my substrate is crushed coral. I will look more to try & find the little piece. I would think it would stand out. I want to say I should not worry! Hopefully I can find it, if it is in the tank.

[Instar]

I've used that kind of substrate before. Dropped a wire in the tank and it was gone forever. I do not recall ever finding the wire. It was a long time ago, but, I don't really have any archives of memory locked into disasters for that. Trouble is that inside, down deep into the crushed coral, the pH is low so it could go into solution easier. Such a small thing though, I'm thinking the tank inhabitants will detox it and coraline will encrust it onto the rocks, locking it up tight and as a carbonate insoluable solid type complex. Some will be encrusted, any free amount will get locked into caulerpa or whatever you use for nutrient/toxin export and be gone. And, if the coral happens to include a few molecules into the skeletons, its definietly not going to hurt anything after that. It will be buried beneath calcium. I think both Shimek and Holmes-Farley have address the detox capacity of a reef as part of the issue of heavy metals in salt mixes, trace element additions and in the foods we dump in there if you want to search for their articles.

[RobertG]

Larry I trust your knowledge on this one. I have been searching for this little thing & have had no luck. I would like to say it did'nt go into the tank. However I do not know. I think this is just something I will learn from. Hopefully it's just a thought & not in there at all. Such a small piece should not be a issue in this large of a tank. If it were straight copper I would be more worried. I just cant see where it would of went. I looked everywhere!