Corrosion on stand

[Eric the half-bee]

My inwall 400 gal is sitting on a rectangular tube steel stand. The stand was matte black from the factory(Aquariums for You). Its been running 2 years now and I'm seeing some surface rust on the stand. Do I need to be concerned/worried and deal with this or is this normal?

 

[Eric the half-bee]

Any opines?

 

[Shane Hoffman]

I would sand it down where ever there is rust (it will take alot of time but it only gets worse) Prime it and repaint it. I am a bit OCD though when it comes to my tank. That being said, strcturally the stand will last much longer than the tank....even with sme surface rust.

 

[AquaticFins]

While certainly not ideal, it's not the end of the world.

I would suggest that the best thing to do is to remove the surface rust (sand/grind it away) and use a corrosion-resistant paint (I'm a fan of POR-15 for this sort of application, but there are lots of options) to coat the bare metal.

If you're seeing rust bubbling up from inside the paint/powdercoat, that's a much bigger problem. Surface rust needs to be addressed, but shouldn't be a major worry.

 

[Eric the half-bee]

Thanks Gents. I'll post a pic. My concern is that if I paint, some amount of VOCs may get in the water even if I cover all surfaces. Am I worried about nothing?

 

[Eric the half-bee]

Here's 2 pics.

 

[sbs5950]

looks to be surface rust but that will only get worse...

geez should have sealed that steel with something before you put it into a salt environment - no way to really fix that now as it is pretty widespread.. dunno what to say about that.. :sad1:

 

[leslie hempel]

it can be fixed but it will most likley be a temporary solution to a long term problem.. there are water based rust converters hat will act as a primer that can be applied but it goes without saying that caution will need to be taken not to spill any such chemical into the sump and id recoment switching skimmers off to stop the venturi from pulling in any fumes..

the best bet would be to sand blast and galvanise the stand.. you could go further and epoxy prime and topcoat the galvanised steel prior to an acid wash.. (i work with steel alot ) unfortunatley this will mean pulling the tank down..

my advice: build a new stand and do a swap over this will reduce time that the corals etc will be subjected to stress..

the old stand can be used for a future tank or frag setup.

 

[malawiman]

i agree with leslie for sure. time to take the tank down and repair the stand. that sucks :sad2:. i would be sure to watch for humidity and or splashing on any surface of the stand, rusty dripps cannot be good if they found their way to your tank water. by the pics this apears to be a possibility. i would contact the people that made the stand and atleast make them aware of the issue so this wont happen to someone else in the future.

 

[malawiman]

btw is that a drip of rust on the left pvc on the first pic? before suspending our 1000w from the ceiling i was using a custom rack that mounted on my 150 stock tank. my father in law made it from machine steel and painted it with many coats of outdoor use water resistant paint. after a few months of sw splashing it was all rusted out and in my opinion contributed to a large break out of cyno in our system.

 

[Eric the half-bee]

Thanks for the feedback guys. It's impossible to take the tank down as it is a glass 400 in wall setup. I'm gonna have to treat it in place. I kick myself for not thinking about this when setting up initially. Chalk one up for poor foresight.