Disaster Strikes!

I had to leave town for work, So my son usually takes care of the the tank while I'm gone. He feeds to tank and tops off the water.

So 2 days into my trip, he calls me a says. What's with the tank? the pumps aren't running.

Not only were the pumps not running, the whole tank had stopped functioning. After some remote trouble shooting, we came to find out the the GFI had tripped. This takes everything out in the tank.

More trouble shooting, It appears that a faulty heater was the culprit. My son plugged in a backup heater in to the power strip and the heating light came on. The temperature in the tank had dropped to 65DegF.

So problem solved, and keeping our fingers crossed  that nothing had died.
We  monitored the temperature for a couple of days and it seems to be steady at 78.5F

Next question: Hey dad, how come the lights are never on? After a couple of days we finally get a chance to trouble shoot this problem. Apparently the heater took out the controller power strip and the circuit breaker reset is not working. After another mad scramble to find good old fashioned timers, we have light in the tank again.

Between the heater and the no lights for 4 days, I did end up loosing some corals. My orange crush acan and the pulsing xenias are goners. My Blue chalice took a big hit. I hope it will recover.
Good news: non the fish died.

Lesson learned: Have your tank on multiple outlets with seperate GFI's , so that at least 1 pump can keep going if a heater misbehaves. and always have equipment on standby.

I'm back!

OK, I never really left.
I had stuff stuff in survival mode for over a year and I finally put my 90G back together.
This recreated system uses all the same components as before:

• 30G sump
• ASM G3 skimmer
• Eheim 1262 return pump
• 6x55W T5's
• AquaController jr.

Here is a picture of the reborn 90G:

I had 1 casualty from the transfer to the new system, my Hippo tang, who seemed healthy and was eating well was found dead 5 days after the transfer.

RIP little buddy:

 

I will keep you posted of the goings on of the 90G reborn.