Water, water everywhere and all the boards did stink
... OR ... how not to do a water change.
Wet weekend. First, I discovered water on the floor around the 140. Investigation showed a leak around the pump outlet (from the sump to the tank - external pump) and I gently twisted the connection. The connecting seal popped off and proceeded to dump roughly 10 gallons of water onto the floor before I could get everything turned off and remember the cut off valves to stop the reverse flow. Disassembling the unit found it not fixable for external use and the new one that is ordered is an in-sump style. The temporary one we Mcguivered is not back flow protected so we are keeping fingers crossed that we don't loose power for more than a few seconds when we are sleeping or out of the house (back flow valves are manual) until the new one arrives.
Next day, different tank, same results, I was doing a water change on the octopusless tank and got distracted with another project
for a few minutes. Returning to the house, I found a quarter inch of water on the floor and the tank half drained (I
always drain this tank from the sump when it is occupied but obviously was not thinking when I put the siphon in the main tank).
Drains, the
next house will have floor drains!
To add to the saga, after posting the above, the next day we found the garage flooded with saltwater. My RO unit and water storage is in the garage and I keep a pump in both the saltwater and freshwater buckets. We borrowed the pump from the saltwater tank as a temporary fix for the reef. The leaking pump (more powerful) was put in the salt vat. Our quick fix engineering did not allow for the extra power of the original reef tank and half the holding tank had been forcefully applied to the garage floor.
But wait, there is more ...
The night after cleaning up the saltwater we had a terrific set of thunderstorms and Neal assumed the new 1 inch of water on the garage floor was an aftermath but NOOOO. With my out of work status, we have not run the air but with temperatures in the mid 90's I could no longer control the tank temperatures with my fans and hourly bottle of ice in the sumps. We are NOT in AZ and our heat is NOT a dry heat so our AC units pull a lot of water out of the air. The tubing to run the condensing water to the outside is next to my aquarium work section in the garage and the outlet tube had been compromised by my storage drawer, allowing the water to find the floor and not exiting via the drain.
AND THEN
After I finished vacuuming the garage (again) I heard the OTHER wet vac going in the basement. Wading into the unfinished section found Neal vacuuming water. It seems that the water outlet of the other AC unit (we have 3) had cracked and created a mess there as well.
AND FINALLY (I hope)
I got our water bill today and it was 3 times the normal amount ($95). We are hoping this is a result of the dogs watering system leaking (discovered and fixed earlier this month) but are holding our breath for the next bill hoping something more sinister is not involved.
Immediate calm- I wish I could bottle and sell it. The only odor is the ultimate smell of "clean." Even my daughters lift the lid of a tank and breathe deeply when stressed out!
but if you have other hairy animals, they will collect pet hair and it does not come out easily.
