Reefmat 500 troubleshooting help

[kbnh]

I’ve had my reefmat 500 for about 6 months now, I love it but yesterday an issue came up that I have yet to be able to solve it even find another case of this occurring. I have reached out to Red Sea but still waiting to hear back from them( I emailed them yesterday morning)

It started with a jam notification, i went to investigate and there was no jam that I could see but the water was overflowing out the top. I tried to manually advance it but it wouldn’t move. I “cleared” the jam through the app and tried to manual advance on the drive motor again, nothing. I tried to manual advance via the app, nothing. I hand advance the roll after unlocking it from the sides then place it back, a few hours later same issue. I unplugged the unit then plugged it back, nothing. I’m worried that maybe the motor burnt out but it was working fine for a week. The week before that though the media bag they provided had clogged(I promise I have cleaned the bag itself everytime I change the media) which caused the reefmat to advance about 7-10 feet of fleece unnecessarily, maybe it wore out the motor from the constant operation?

anyone have a similar situation or can suggest a possible fix?

 

[blaxsun]

While I don't think this is the cause, I'd remove the media tray and any media (as you've noticed, this prematurely clogs up and results in higher than normal fleece use).

 

[Starter]

Same problem here with my 1200 this morning, looks like motor is burned out. I will contact my lfs for a replacement motor.

 

[Shadowfire]

Same problem today with my reefmat 500, has been working great since June of last year, but just stopped working and is showing jammed, but there is no jam... When I clear the jam in the app and try to advance it manually, I get an "action failed" error message. Did you find a solution?

 

[kbnh]

Same problem today with my reefmat 500, has been working great since June of last year, but just stopped working and is showing jammed, but there is no jam... When I clear the jam in the app and try to advance it manually, I get an "action failed" error message. Did you find a solution?

Contact Red Sea and they will send a new drive unit out, seems to be a common problem, I had mine running for about 6 months, it works great again with the new unit

 

[Shadowfire]

Contact Red Sea and they will send a new drive unit out, seems to be a common problem, I had mine running for about 6 months, it works great again with the new unit

Yes, I contacted them today and they responded quickly and are sending a replacement motor. Great customer service, but a little disappointed that the product failed so quickly. Thanks for the response.

 

[kbnh]

Yes, I contacted them today and they responded quickly and are sending a replacement motor. Great customer service, but a little disappointed that the product failed so quickly. Thanks for the response.

Out of curiosity did you run into an instance where the filter media bag they provide got clogged in the media chamber?

 

[I.AM.MR.MIKE]

My Reefmat 500 motor just failed and waiting for a reply from Red Sea. Been running flawless since July 2022. It has always been loud though.

 

[ZeeReefer]

I’ve had my reefmat 500 for about 6 months now, I love it but yesterday an issue came up that I have yet to be able to solve it even find another case of this occurring. I have reached out to Red Sea but still waiting to hear back from them( I emailed them yesterday morning)

It started with a jam notification, i went to investigate and there was no jam that I could see but the water was overflowing out the top. I tried to manually advance it but it wouldn’t move. I “cleared” the jam through the app and tried to manual advance on the drive motor again, nothing. I tried to manual advance via the app, nothing. I hand advance the roll after unlocking it from the sides then place it back, a few hours later same issue. I unplugged the unit then plugged it back, nothing. I’m worried that maybe the motor burnt out but it was working fine for a week. The week before that though the media bag they provided had clogged(I promise I have cleaned the bag itself everytime I change the media) which caused the reefmat to advance about 7-10 feet of fleece unnecessarily, maybe it wore out the motor from the constant operation?

anyone have a similar situation or can suggest a possible fix?

Exactly same thing happened to me today! RedSea Sweden is, they confirmed, sending a new motor to install before I travel away from the tank starting this weekend but without the help in this forum I'd have been much more lost and frustrated, plus wouldn'thave known exactly what to expect/ask for. I'd also gone through two rolls in less than a month (first two ever) so even though it was getting progressively better, using less fleece each day, I'm going to try taking out or reducing the amount of carbon I keep in the media chamber. Hopefully we'll all get free upgrades when they recall these finicky motors... Way too much value is riding on these working reliably for years, not weeks... It'd be interesting to know their fail rate.

 

[kbnh]

Exactly same thing happened to me today! RedSea Sweden is, they confirmed, sending a new motor to install before I travel away from the tank starting this weekend but without the help in this forum I'd have been much more lost and frustrated, plus wouldn'thave known exactly what to expect/ask for. I'd also gone through two rolls in less than a month (first two ever) so even though it was getting progressively better, using less fleece each day, I'm going to try taking out or reducing the amount of carbon I keep in the media chamber. Hopefully we'll all get free upgrades when they recall these finicky motors... Way too much value is riding on these working reliably for years, not weeks... It'd be interesting to know their fail rate.

Seems to be quite a bit of people with the same issue, my replacement has been doing just fine since. Try raising it so the media chamber is only about 1/2” below the water line, that can help you save on some fleece, also lower the advance rate to the shortest setting. I haven’t put any media in the chamber since I had my motor issue, not worth risking it as much as I liked the idea.

 

[ZeeReefer]

Seems to be quite a bit of people with the same issue, my replacement has been doing just fine since. Try raising it so the media chamber is only about 1/2” below the water line, that can help you save on some fleece, also lower the advance rate to the shortest setting. I haven’t put any media in the chamber since I had my motor issue, not worth risking it as much as I liked the idea.

Time to try out the nifty legs that came with the ReefMat I suppose! I've been hanging it in the sump. The water level is just under the sensor-- maybe 5 cm. For the *media chamber*, way at the bottom, to be that high will be an interesting experiment. Thanks for the idea.

 

[shadyraro]

Time to try out the nifty legs that came with the ReefMat I suppose! I've been hanging it in the sump. The water level is just under the sensor-- maybe 5 cm. For the *media chamber*, way at the bottom, to be that high will be an interesting experiment. Thanks for the idea.

Are you saying your sump water level is 5cm below the sensor or the water in the roller?

 

[ZeeReefer]

Are you saying your sump water level is 5cm below the sensor or the water in the roller?

5 cm below the sensor, on the outside of the chamber where the fleece lives. Inside the chamber, water goes up and down, right? It's rising to the sensor, triggering the fleece motor, causing the water to recede down, then repeatingthe cycle. It works again incidentally, with the new motor, and eats less fleece than with the wonky one!

 

[shadyraro]

5 cm below the sensor, on the outside of the chamber where the fleece lives. Inside the chamber, water goes up and down, right? It's rising to the sensor, triggering the fleece motor, causing the water to recede down, then repeatingthe cycle. It works again incidentally, with the new motor, and eats less fleece than with the wonky one!

Yeah I know how they work, but I was asking is your sump water level on the outside of your roller 5cm below sensor? Or are you referring to the water level inside your roller?

 

[ZeeReefer]

Yeah I know how they work, but I was asking is your sump water level on the outside of your roller 5cm below sensor? Or are you referring to the water level inside your roller?

Outside, yea.

 

[shadyraro]

Outside, yea.

That’s pretty high, my sump water level sits 13cm below the sensors.

 

[richiep]

On the two of my tanks the water level sits just below the top of the intake pipe of the reefmat, I've also had big problems with the motor and sensor on my feefmat, the tray on the bottom sounded like a good idea at the time but as they clog up your fleese starts to work overtime, imo a bad move by redsea

 

[Joj]

Just a thought from my accidental experience - the motor on the Reefmat from factory might not be the most reliable in the long term (undersize? Underpowered?) therefore the motor burns out?

Curious for those of you with the motor, how high you run the water level in your Reefmat?

If you run the water level in your Reefmat lower, the pressure will be greater (usually means fleece should last a bit longer too) but will put more stress on the motor to pull up the fleece since there is more internal water pressure when water level gets up to the top?


Running the Reefmat with a higher water level inside the Reefmat (ie without the legs) might make the motor last longer as there is less water pressure = easier for the motor to move the fleece. This ‘might’ contribute to less stress on the motor and it lasting longer?

This is just conjecture on my part with my observation as I used legs with my Reefmat 1200 and the original roll it came with. Water level was just right above the intake tube and it worked great. The roll lasted about 30 days. But I switched to a 80micron aftermarket roll (preconfilter) and the Reefmat kept saying ‘jammed’ as the smaller micron roll made the fleece stick onto the side of the roller (because of greater water pressure), the motor couldn’t pull it up. Even, by hand, it took some effort to pull up the fleece when clogged. So I took off the legs and water level went up by about 3 inches above the intake pipe (pressure inside the Reefmat decreases) and the roller motor was then able to pull up the fleece with no issue.

Hopefully the new motor you guys are getting is an improvement (hardware wise vs the original ones).

I only had my Reefmat 1200 for two months so still seems reliable.

 

[AZReef13]

I had same problem awhile back. It’s the motor, Red Sea will want some pictures of mat. Short video of you hold advance button. Plus receipt. They will then send a replacement part for inside motor.

 

[shadyraro]

My ReefMat hangs on the edge of sump, and I also had an issue with the unit switching off and thought it was the motor. Red Sea sent me a new drive unit but that wasn’t the problem, as when I installed it it still did the same thing. The problem was the power plug which connects to unit, if I held it in a certain place it would work, so I’ve since cable tied it to the other plug and it’s been working fine.