Tank Crash Discussion/Help Thread

[prsnlty]

Hi everyone! We never think or at least we hope it will never happen to our own tank then bam it happens - the tank crashed! A crash is never expected and when it happens most of us panic... we scramble looking for information and help to save it. I know because it finally happened to me due to a power outage. I found that finding the right info is very hard to do.

I created this thread in hopes of those with experience to add their do's and don'ts from what they themselves experienced. This is NOT for "you should've done...." as it is already too late for that! It's a place to go for help. I don't know everything but I am willing to help anyone who posts to this thread any time of day or night.

**** Once we get enough information I'd like to create a FAQ To be added to this post. I hope you all chime in who have learned a thing or 2 about crashes. There are many causes so please list your cause and what fixes worked and what didn't. Thanks!

 

[prsnlty]

I'll start.

If you had a power outage immediately get air into the dt and sump. If this did not happen your good bacteria will die. If you had a doser running at the time of the crash watch it! Test a lot for the alk levels particularly. Do a wc but don't go crazy. Too much too fast will add to the already bad situation. Yes, water changes are our friend but to a degree. In my situation the power was out 2 hours before I knew it was. I added air bubblers and 5 hrs in I got a generator to run the return. In hind-site I realized my bacteria had already died in those 1st 2 hours. I lost 40 acros one by one. As they were not taking up the alk the alk spiked because I had the doser running! They still looked ok so I didn't think they may already be dying.

 

[jsker]

Thank you Jackie for putting together this thread, I want through mine last November. Mine was due to running slowed down bio pellet reactor which created the release of hydrogen sulfate production.
On the bright side, corals that I thought were completely dead, came back. I have a new rule, I wait two months be for I toss a dead looking coral.

 

[prsnlty]

Thank you Jackie for putting together this thread, I want through mine last November. Mine was due to running slowed down bio pellet reactor which created the release of hydrogen sulfate production.
On the bright side, corals that I thought were completely dead, came back. I have a new rule, I wait two months be for I toss a dead looking coral.

Oh wow I didn't know that could happen!

I just felt like this is an overlooked subject and it happens often enough that it should be.

I agree about seemingly dead coral... Wish I could have left all of mine but once that rtn ball was rolling and I couldn't since they were poisoning the tank and adding to the issue

What did you do that helped and what didn't?

 

[jeff williams]

I'll start.

If you had a power outage immediately get air into the dt and sump. If this did not happen your good bacteria will die. If you had a doser running at the time of the crash watch it! Test a lot for the alk levels particularly. Do a wc but don't go crazy. Too much too fast will add to the already bad situation. Yes, water changes are our friend but to a degree. In my situation the power was out 2 hours before I knew it was. I added air bubblers and 5 hrs in I got a generator to run the return. In hind-site I realized my bacteria had already died in those 1st 2 hours. I lost 40 acros one by one. As they were not taking up the alk the alk spiked because I had the doser running! They still looked ok so I didn't think they may already be dying.

My question would be as simple as nitrifying bacteria is, you think 2 hrs is ample time to kill the bacteria? Are you basing this on an ammonia spike after the fact ? And if so could it be the bacteria just couldn't handle the load from other things that died in the tank during the power outage? Just curious because this is a real threat to our tanks if we only have a 1-2 hr window. But as far as the thread goes great idea

 

[brett_schn]

Following

 

[prsnlty]

My question would be as simple as nitrifying bacteria is, you think 2 hrs is ample time to kill the bacteria? Are you basing this on an ammonia spike after the fact ? And if so could it be the bacteria just couldn't handle the load from other things that died in the tank during the power outage? Just curious because this is a real threat to our tanks if we only have a 1-2 hr window. But as far as the thread goes great idea

I didn't think it would have been the case at first. However I have or had a huge bio load between fish and coral. My sand sifting goby was the first to go and that is what actually clued me in that the tank was beginning to crash. I saw no other immediate issues but sure did smell it. So after all I had been through these past 2 months I believe the bacteria died off 1st then everything began to snowball. The snowballing added and added and added to it.

@Fin posted a bubbler on another thread I had never heard of which I think would've been a God send had I had it in place. It is both AC & DC and when the power goes out the batteries take over. https://www.amazon.com/dp/B004PBIKHU/_encoding=UTF8?coliid=IXMD786SXEWIC&colid=3DT3F11065BDG ... In case anyone is interested.

 

[prsnlty]

To add to my post above. I couldn't test for ammonia because I loaned out my test kit the day before, but the nitrates went through the roof (so to speak). When I had power again I began huge water changes back to back and went through 1.5 200g boxes of salt in a little over a week. Some things that I did I am not sure if it was good or bad because of how much was going on. But when I collected myself I stopped the water changes and began adding bacteria. Now the tank has leveled out and nothing is dying anymore. Color is returning as well as some corals are re-encrusting such as monti's.

 

[jsker]

Oh wow I didn't know that could happen!

I just felt like this is an overlooked subject and it happens often enough that it should be.

I agree about seemingly dead coral... Wish I could have left all of mine but once that rtn ball was rolling and I couldn't since they were poisoning the tank and adding to the issue

What did you do that helped and what didn't?

I agree. For what circumstance the tank crash is not talked about in depth. It took me a month before I wanted to do the happy daily look at the tank. It has been 6 months since my crash and I am still dealing to small cycles of cyano, diatoms, etc. Besides all the negatives of a crash, some take a break and most ride it out after the disappointment but we are back reefing and tweaking and adjusting after a short time.

 

[Ashish Patel]

I had a very similar negative effect as you did but for a different reason. I finally decided to dose some flourish nitrogen (after hearing soo much positive feedback:mad to get detectable nitrates because i determined this was the cause of my monti's paling problems. In hindsight I should have gone slower but read a post on forum saying to dose more the first day since your tank will absorbe it fast.. (Take advice with grain of salt!).. Needless to say I lost the weakest links of the tank and my healthy SPS who started developing a ring of white around the base. Fast forward a month later after nitrates where back to normal range I went away for the weekend wedding (2 weeks ago) and for my eheim feeder was dumping in maybe 5-10 times more food then I would have liked causing a massive PO increase and cyano issue. The few corals that had taken the nitrate spike well started developing rings around their bases but they seem to be stabilized.


Lesson learned
1. Reasons to change one thing at a time: Unlike fish and non-SPS corals, SPS corals can NOT handle fast shift in parameter very well. Most of the time when its a parameter shift effects show after 7-14 days with gradual on-set; this is why we have to change one thing and give it 7-14 days to ensure its not a Negative. Top reason why hobbyist report having SPS crap out after 14 days in a new tank; they where holding of until their expiration date.

2. If a new coral can survive in my tank for one month and encrusted some then I am on the right track. Glue them and never interfere even when few other corals may not be doing well. Changing too much for few corals could result in other things going out of wack for few other corals down the road (see 1). Thing of the ocean - you'll never get nitrate go from 0.02 to 2PPM in 24 hr period as happened in my tank! If I had gone from 0.02 to 0.06 I am sure the bleaching would have never happened.

3. Keep your nutrients as close to undetectable is fine as long as you have a healthy bio load and feeding well - The tank will absorb the nutrients and its a sign of good biological filter and bacteria growth. Instead lower your light intensity and reduce your skimmer usage by 50%. Nutrients will go up as your tank matures when gunk buildsup in your rocks, pipes, sand, etc. Its better to have lower nutrients and work your way you then down. try and do it naturally.

4. I strongly believe SPS corals bleach and RTN for many reasons but few constant is that there ability to acclimate to your tanks water parameters and lighting and most importantly how stable those parameters are on a daily,weekly and monthly basis (5-10% in range).

Hope this helps

 

[AllSignsPointToFish]

I don't know if you've seen it, but I put together a little article a while back to help with some of these questions. Hope it helps...if not, please feel free to ask questions.

https://www.reef2reef.com/ams/youre-not-powerless-surviving-a-power-interruption.262/

 

[Ashish Patel]

I don't know if you've seen it, but I put together a little article a while back to help with some of these questions. Hope it helps...if not, please feel free to ask questions.

https://www.reef2reef.com/ams/youre-not-powerless-surviving-a-power-interruption.262/

Thanks for sharing.. I can totally see my tank having major loss even with my vortech on battery backup with anything over 24 hrs of power loss. What about the slime production of SPS effect on the tank after 12 hrs and if things start to die and cause a biological nightmare. In extended power outages how often to test Alk, PH, Nitrates? I am in the middle of making a cryptic filter which could serve as a life-line in an event of poweroutage. I feel my tank could survive with minimal issues for 3-7 days as long as I return pump (vectra on battery backup), along with protein skimmer (for oxygen and filter), and 1 heater is continuous. I wish eheim and reefoctopus made a battery backup for their products that was as simple as ecotechs backup.

 

[Amoo]

I learned from my first crash to prevent a new one just this past week.

I have my Return pump only wired directly to the battery backup side of my UPS. This gives me a little over an hour to get the inverter hooked up, which I ran nothing but the return pump in my tank for 36 hours simply off of my truck just running the inverter. Once it was safe I got the generator online and restored power to the tank.

What helped? Having redundant methods to ensure I can at least run my return pump in almost ANY situation assuming my house still has a roof. Even if my generator didn't start for the next few days, there was nothing I could have done about photosynthetic losses, but I would not have lost my bacteria or ran out of oxygen in my tank.

Only having battery backup on my powerheads and no running water in my sump crashed my last tank.

 

[prsnlty]

I had a few huge slimers in my tank when the downhill snowball ( actually Avalanche) affect began that were sliming like crazy when I woke up during the outage. I could smell them 10' away! The power was already out for about 4 hours at that point. I added bubblers but had no way to do a quick wc. Another hour goes by when my husband remembered he had a generator on his truck and asked if it would work to get the return running. Duh lol.... so that's what we did. However, by that time I believe it was too late. The sandsifter had died, the water smelled awful, most acros were now sliming. I did wc after wc. But within 2 weeks I lost most acro colonies and frags. EXCEPT the slimers. A few others were barely hanging on and got better as I added bacteria. Color came back and they were recovering. Then my doser tube clogged up and honestly I didn't notice because my tests came out ok. THEN I found the clogged tube and cleaned it.... bam high alk in a day. There wasn't anything much left to drink it up like before - 2nd crash began and now the only SPS left are monti's and one small pinope birdsnest. Since all the SPS loses I have basically been doing regular maintenance. Not adding any new livestock of any kind. The tank has had a strange rust dust in it and now since the hurricane a good amount of cyano. Ran tests yesterday and found p04 at .12 and no3 at 10ppm. Way more than this tank is used to. I used to have to do stump remover in order to get no.3. And po4 was nearly always at 0 or barely detectable all the way up to the hurricane hitting. Power was out at my house for three and a half days and I had to air bubblers in it and turned the return on every couple of hours or so with the generator from my husband's truck. I had no losses of any kind however I have very little SPS. So right now I'm not super thrilled with my tank and nothing I do makes it better. I've even thought about breaking it all down. If it wasn't for the fish that I have I probably would have already done so. But some of them are like family because of how long I've had them.

 

[Ashish Patel]

Jackie - I sorry your going through this! despite your best efforts things like hurricanes and power outages are out of your control.. especially right now all you see is them talking about a new hurricane coming.. You want to make sure your fish are good but you have to take care of yourself and family first and foremost... Continue in this hobby and try to take the good with the bad even though the bad really stinks.. Best

 

[prsnlty]

Jackie - I sorry your going through this! despite your best efforts things like hurricanes and power outages are out of your control.. especially right now all you see is them talking about a new hurricane coming.. You want to make sure your fish are good but you have to take care of yourself and family first and foremost... Continue in this hobby and try to take the good with the bad even though the bad really stinks.. Best

Thank you I probably won't give it up... I'm just in a low spot I think. The tank was growing beautifully. I actually had large SPS colonies (3 years ago I couldn't keep an acro alive). The tank was stable and then the hammer falls... ugh. I guess the only people who really understand this are we who have been through a major crash. And partly why I started this thread

What?! Another one??? I haven't turned the tv on since the power went out from IRMA. Ugh... guess I better take a look.

 

[AllSignsPointToFish]

I also have two 114Ah deep cycle batteries and two inverters that I can hook up as a bridge until I get the generator running. The pump and skimmer are on UPS, and I have a battery backup on one of the powerheads. Maybe this will give you some ideas on a strategy.

Do you run an Apex? Did you have it configured to notify you in a power outage?

 

[AllSignsPointToFish]

And yes, there is another category 5 storm out there tonight pounding the island of Dominica

 

[prsnlty]

I also have two 114Ah deep cycle batteries and two inverters that I can hook up as a bridge until I get the generator running. The pump and skimmer are on UPS, and I have a battery backup on one of the powerheads. Maybe this will give you some ideas on a strategy.

Do you run an Apex? Did you have it configured to notify you in a power outage?

Yes I do but that night it wasn't in my room so I didn't hear the notification. Although I might not have heard it any way even if it was in my room because my phone 'dings' all night long. I have yet to come up with a way to have fusion messages with it's own sound. I wonder if there's such an alarm that you can plug into a power outlet that would sound (loudly) upon power loss? Much like how the ac/dc bubblers work.

I do have 1 750 watt power inverter but need to get a deep cycle battery. We are looking into a 9000 watt generator when this hurricane season is over and they go on sale. My husband will put a switch over/transfer box (not sure what the actual name is for it) on it with well, the dedicated tank power, fridge and 4 emergency outlets on it.

 

[AllSignsPointToFish]

Transfer switch is the correct term as you used it

Have you considered this item?
POWER FAIL LIGHT W/ALARM by RELIANCE CONTROLS MfrPartNo THP207M https://www.amazon.com/dp/B018A30T8Q/ref=cm_sw_r_cp_apa_o5hWzbA10VKK2