Beware of your ATO!!

[Dkray944]

Ok, today was definitely a bad day for reefing. I woke up really early and was running out of the house to catch a flight for an important meeting a saw a completely white tank. I could see more then an inch in. My JBJ ATO got stuck on and dumped over 30g of fully saterated kalk into my 220g display tank. Nominally I would drop everything to fix it but this was a meeting I just couldn't miss. Instead I had to wake my wife up to do a water change as I was heading to the airport. As you can imagine she was not happy but was very supportive. A BIG thanks to Mike for coming over and helping her short through what was dead and alive. I lost countless fish and over 5k of coral. The good news is that Mike was able to save quit a bit and store it at his house. Also a big thanks to a couple of his friends that have volunteered to house some peices as well. Here's some before and after pictures. Lessons learned... Always have a backup to catch issues like this. The thing that really sucks is I actually have an Apex gold unopened waiting on my new tank to arrive which is scheduled to be here in 3-4 weeks. This should make an ihteresting buildout thread.... More to come

[Dkray944]

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[Zack]

Really sorry to hear David, glad mike was able to get some stuff in his tank!

[Davie118]

So sad! Everything was doing so well and looked fantastic. I'm glad it wasn't a total loss though.

~Greg

[quicksilverz]

I did what I could we can only see whats up in the morning.

[quicksilverz]

both large montis and one large SPS have no clue the name are at RICKS house in his 125 and alot of frags (ruffly 20 or so) went to Brandon skidmore 140 Tank everything else is in the 214 I have and o Man its packed.

[quicksilverz]

27335 apparently now I have a problem collecting frags

[leliataylor]

David, I am glad others were able to help you out and I am very sorry for the losses you sustained. Hopefully what Mike rescued will recover.

[quicksilverz]

Most of the frogspawn and torches made it alot the the lps and sps took major hits i trashed a 5 gallon bucket or more of colonies it was sad

[Dkray944]

Yea it really sucks. I lost a lot of really nice pieces and fish. I'm so thankful though for Mike helping out and everyone housing some corals for me. At least when I get things stabilized I won't be starting from ground zero. Mother Nature definitely thought me a lesson. Don't trust your equipment and make sure you plan for the unexpected. Looks like I'll be buying a lot of coral at the swap.

[Troy Valentine]

This is tragic!! I've spent a few sleepless nights thinking about this. I am glad to hear you are on the right path for regrowth.

[12_Egg_Omelette]

Oh man, this is horrible. I was just about to contact you as well to see if you finally switched over to that calcium reactor. Something like this is always a worry of mine with using kalk. The same thing happened to a buddy of mine that I was watching his tank for when he was out of town. His ATO got stuck and pumped out a ton of saturated water. Didn't look like it happened that long before I got there. I gave him a call to make sure this was abnormal and did a water change everything bounced back.

[rrasco]

That's tragic, the before and after pics are horrible.

Was the ATO a float valve or a float switch to a relay? Did the system overflow?

This is why I only use a 5 gallon bucket for my ATO and manually fill it, the worst that can happen is 4-5G of water dumping. I do not run kalk though.

[Dkray944]

That's tragic, the before and after pics are horrible.

Was the ATO a float valve or a float switch to a relay? Did the system overflow?

This is why I only use a 5 gallon bucket for my ATO and manually fill it, the worst that can happen is 4-5G of water dumping. I do not run kalk though.

Im not sure quit yet because I'm still out of town and haven't had a chance to look at it closely. The ATO has an internal timer I set so that it would dump so much so I'm assuming the float switch got stuck and the timer failed. It dumped enough to cause the sump to overflow which I've designed to hold lots of excess water for random issues like this. The new tank is going to have s tunze ATO system that has its check and balances. Then I'm going to also hook up an apex breakout box with its in set of float switches to monitor the water for a high and low point that will then cut off pumps. I'm also going to set up the apex to kill the tunze ATO unit if the ph swings to a certain point.

[12_Egg_Omelette]

I'm willing to donate a couple frags once you get up and running to help replace anything you lost.

[leliataylor]

If it makes you feel any better, anybody that has been in this hobby for a long time has had their share of disasters. Equipment failures and power outages are our nemesis. It is tragic what happened to your and you are going to rebuild. Kudos to you for hanging in there, most people would have given up. All I can say is build redundancy into anything you have on a tank. I feel for you.

[rrasco]

If it makes you feel any better, anybody that has been in this hobby for a long time has had their share of disasters. Equipment failures and power outages are our nemesis. It is tragic what happened to your and you are going to rebuild. Kudos to you for hanging in there, most people would have given up. All I can say is build redundancy into anything you have on a tank. I feel for you.

Indeed. Unfortunately sometimes it takes a disaster for us to find our faults.

[leliataylor]

Any news on what made it?

[quicksilverz]

A lot of the sps died i would say 70% diad and about 90% of the lps survived

[Dkray944]

Definitely lost all lot of sps. Mainly only the digi's and some monti's survived. I've been out of town all week so I'm sure it's going to hit home when I see it in person. Also thank you Egg omlet, I'm sure I'll be taking you up on that when you get to SA.

[Dkray944]

Picture of the cleaned up aftermath.....

http://images.tapatalk-cdn.com/15/09/13/4493ab7c23a6242e19df4cebcc07f01e.jpg


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[Davie118]

Ouch....I am soo sorry this happened. It was so pretty. If you need help with anything in the future I will do what I can.

~Greg

[Francis]

Sorry for ur loss David. I saw the tank when it was flourishing and full of beautiful corals. I'm sure you'll get it back to that state in no time.
It's a very good idea to have the apex in unforeseen things like this. Mechanical parts will eventually fail and you have some peace of mind that u have some kind of insurance when things like this happen.
Good luck man!


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[Dean]

Man David,
I can't tell you how sorry I am buddy. What an awesome collection you had... and for you to have to notice while on your way out the door to catch a flight for an important business meeting? I can't even imagine. I bet that was a long business trip! I am glad to see that you didn't throw your hat in. Hang in there!

[quicksilverz]

I felt like the grim reaper cleaning up thoes poor corals. But on a positive note a lot has survived and he has a good start on a great come back.

[Paul28]

omg man sorry for your loss :(

[Bill S]

Dang. Sorry to see/hear about this.

[Dkray944]

I appreciate it. Hopefully it'll be back to its glory days soon enough.

[Jasonb]

I would also be willing to donate a few frags when your ready.

[Dkray944]

Thank you


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