Southpawblues
New member
Wondering if anyone has encountered a tank meltdown like the one that just happened in my house. I set up my second tank after having really great success with a 30 gallon nano. My second tank was 120 gallons plumbed through my first floor to the basement where I set up a sump and frag tank. I really got into zoas and palys and started a nice collection. The tank was cruising along then ....wham......coral started closing up and eventually lost many pieces. A fellow reefer suggested I try a poly filter which I did.....it turned blue indicating copper but I could not figure out the source of the copper. I broke that system down and essentially started over. My second go with a big tank started great but a couple weeks ago.......the same thing started to happen, and yes, the poly filter again indicated copper. For the life of me I could not solve the mystery....until this past weekend. A friend and fellow reefer was over and we were playing fish tanks ( comparing test kit results to see if that was the issue) I happened to look up over my frag tank to see my main copper water line coming in from outside sweating drops of water that were going into my frag tank and sump. When the temp was higher in my basement with the very cold water coming from the outside ( I live in Illinois) the pipe would sweat and drip into my system. My question is......could this have leached the copper into my system. Copper testing was in detectable. Snails would die but crabs and my cleaner shrimp survived. I hope I have found the problem. Needless to say, Those pipes have now been wrapped in foam pipe insulation
) Sometimes the answer is a dropped screw or wire cutting in the tank that might never be found until it is totally broken down.
