Hellpppppp!!!!!!!

[algae]

Please go down to the Uh Oh... thread. I need assistance pronto.

You know, I swear to god that people can't or don't bother to read. I'm having a serious plumbing problem and I've got water everywhere. I can't refit the hoses on the Hydor heater because water comes pouring out of it, and I only have two hands. Somebody please weigh in.

I hate plumbing. I must have had rocks in my head to ever think that a tank of water with PLUMBING should ever go in my living room. I've had this tank running for two weeks, and already I want to tear it down and throw it out back. PITA!

[jgc]

Is your tank hard plumbed? If not, turn off the pump and pull out the intake and spay bar for a minute or two (turn off intake and output valves if you got em, will also keep water from going elsewhere. Should limit the water on the floor while you make emergency repairs

At liest your tank is not upstairs...
Mine was...
I had a seem give out... Luckily slowly enough to get the fish in an ice chest and do 1/2 of an emergency 100% water change...

Had I not gotten that call from my gf, I would have had parts of my downstairs ceiling on my floor by the time I got home from work...

[algae]

I'm not sure I know what you mean by "hard" plumbed. But, I did pull spray bar and that seemed to empty what I needed.

You know, that sounds simple, but when you've never done this before, and you have water shooting out of two places at once, it's a wee bit difficult to calmly, rationally figure out what to do.

[GraFFix]

Im sorry to hear about your frustration, but honestly I dont see what the problem is?

Turn off the pumps/canister whatever you have, have a bucket ready and pull the return hose out of the tank (which im guessing your heater is on) if it still has water in the line then dump it into the bucket. redo the hoses to the heater to fix it...set the return back in the tank, prime the filter and ENJOY the tank.

if the Hydor is leaking then you have might have to go another route. If you dont have new hose you can just get a plastic coupler from a hardware stoire to connect the hoses together as a temp fix.

Now when your landlord calls you at work telling you that the people who live under you are complaining about water flowing down their walls from upstairs then you worry...wasnt that bad of a spill though, only like 30 gallons

[algae]

O.K. What I wanted to do from the start was to put a ball valve on the outflow before the spray bar just for such emergencies. Or at least between the Hydor and the UV. But I read on one of the "how-to" sites to NEVER put a valve on the outflow. Is this right?

[jgc]

was refering to reef tanks with bulkhead fittings (hoses go through the bottom glass). The plumbing is intergal to the tank. As far as I know, there is no way to pull out the intake and spray heads on those (without draining the tank first). I suspect, however, they do have good cut offs.

[algae]

O.K. Sorry for the panic. G asked what the problem was. Basically it was an inexperience person seeing water shooting from both heater connections. Next time I'll know to pull the spray bar first.

[GraFFix]

Hehe, understandable...We've all been there at one time or another. Main tools for keeping a fishtank...buckets and lots of towels.

Just remember with any leak the main concern is to stop the flow of water as best as you can. In this case it was tirning off the canister filter feeding the water and then pulling the spraybar breaking the syphon...and as you found out no more leaking and all the time in the world to fix the problem.

Glad you got it taken care of.

[eds]

If tales of personal stupidity make you feel any better, my eheim ecco has valves on the tubes, so you can shut them, and then disconnect from the filter.
I'm sure you can imagine my surprise the first time went to disconnect my xp3 (to install my Hydor, as a matter of fact!)
It really is quite surprising, the series of emotions you quickly go through when confronted by spurting water in your living space! Disbelief, worry, anger, decapitated chicken on an adrenaline rush - and of course, once you stopped the flow, the inevitable "How could I have been that stupid?!"
I suspect it is an exceptional individual indeed who can remain completely cool and collected in such circumstances.

[jgc]

My eheim has the same quick disconnects. You just get into the habbit of turning off the valves and unscrewing the two sides. Course in my stand it is hard to bend over and see what you are doing - so I usually do this by feel.

Very surprised the time I unscrewed a hose rather than the quick disconnect...