Tank disaster

[ReefPharmer]

To be fair to the company, every company out there makes their warranty as "company friendly" as possible. They arent in the business of losing money on claims. It is POSSIBLE for a stand to be poorly built and cause failure. I am not saying it is the case here, we dont specifically know, but all companies protect themselves and pay out only in cases where they absolutely have to.

 

[1panman1]

again, that is why I want to see the written warranty. I have a cadlights custom 75 tank and was told it has a lifetime warranty. I was stupid to not ask to see the warranty. I have a lee mar stand and changed the plumbing as the supplied plumbing was pitiful. The would probably say that voids the warranty. Please Eddie post your written warranty.

 

[SoloGarth]

Wow that warranty is total BS. So basically if you buy one of their tanks be prepared to hand off ALL design, construction, and setup or your entire system to them or you have no warranty.

Personally I feel like this could happen with any tank but that warranty is BS.

 

[SoloGarth]

I just read the warranty for my custom tank. I was curious after reading this. It states that if you use a stand other than theirs that the warranty period is 1 year instead of 5. Nothing about install supervision or plumbing.

It does also state that loss of livestock personal injury damage ect it not covered.

 

[XaznKewLguyX]

They must have made a quick change regarding warranty on their website also.

 

[Steve1714]

I'm sorry this had to happen to you Ivan.
I see you joined Reef Central back in 2001! I've known you since 2003 so I can safely assume you have been in the hobby for more than 14 years. I also noticed that you put solar panels on your house which in my book is a statement that you will be in this hobby another 14+ years.
Your case against this company is very strong and it is my guess that they are trying to keep you quiet until your time to sue them has expired (statute of limitations) which in California is three years from the event.

My observations from your pictures;
first thing i notice is that all the silicone is left on the front panel. To me this could be one of two things; first would be improper cleaning of the three panel edges to remove oils and other contaminants. However if this were the case it would be unlikely that every bit of the edge would be contaminated to the point that it is totality free of residual silicone. So I would bet the real reason this happened was due to the silicone skinning over before the panel was placed into position. Reading the directions on a quality silicone it reads;
"Directions:
ASI Aquarium Silicone Sealant is ready to use and
requires no mixing or additives. The cure mechanism
begins as soon as the sealant comes in contact
with the air. At conditions of 25°C (77°F) and 50%
relative humidity, the sealant will skin in 10 minutes
and fully cure in 24 hours (1/8” bead) and reaches
its maximum adhesion in 7 days."
It must have taken them more than 10 minutes to get that 200 pound glass panel into place.

Second thing that stands out, from an engineering standpoint, is that the euro brace across the front appears to only be 2 inches or so wide and 1/2" thick on a tank that is 8 feet long using 3/4" glass. There doesn't appear to be any top brace that was connecting the middle front to the middle back to prevent bowing, and it looks like they compensated for this by using an 18" wide euro-brace on each end. So this 2" wide lip was spanning 60" across the front of the tank. Did you ever have any issues with this part of the tank? Was it your design to have the tank built like this and did they ever say this was unsafe?

I am very willing to stand by these statements and I encourage your house insurance agency to test this for themselves and bring it to court if needed as proof that there Aquarium building practice is inadequate and lacking competence for a tank of this size.

You are very lucky no one got hurt or.....

Steve Garrett

 

[dodgerblew]

I think an important fact not being recognized is the OP made this quote in his first or second post
"An engineer has determined that the cause of failure was all in the manufacture of the tank."

It's already been proven the stand isn't responsible, there's no way his plumbing will cause a front panel to blow out and I'd like to know what aquarium company is going to respond to a request for them to take time out of their busy lives to "come over" to watch and approve my installation. This is complete nonsense.

What's sad to me is that this incident is most likely an extremely rare occurrence for this company. I'd think if this happened in the past we'd know about it, don't you?! I mean within a day this thread has already been reposted on other forums! If this company really wanted to be accountable and show some compassion they would have just taken care of their mistake as well as the collateral damage incurred and chalked it up to a bad but isolated incident and moved on. The OP has kept this quiet for a year and a half and I'm convinced we would never have known about this had they stepped up. Now this incident is getting around which can't help Cadlights business and what's worse for Cadlights is we now know about this "the Devils in the details" warranty which also can't help any future orders. Shame on you and if your small company becomes smaller as a result of this incident and your handling of it, that's on you. In the long run I think you'll find it would've been cheaper to settle this then to have it exposed.

 

[MizTanks]

This will give me nightmares [emoji53] I'm so sorry you and your family had to go through this.

 

[pandimus]

I would think cadlights would carry insurance for such and occurrence..

 

[WahDi]

Omg. Am I seeing it right? Sorry for the loss.
Please forgive me for hijacking your thread a moment because this is seriously making me nervous.
I am in the process of ordering a custom tank for 8'x2'x2' with .75 inch starphire front with euro-bracing top and bottom from visio. Any thoughts about the company?
Back to your disaster. Please understand me. I am not trying to help Cadlight or anything. But if you think carefully. Why did Leemar quit making tank when they have such a high reputation. I mean every equipment, machine, or craftsmanship has a flaw sometimes. And in reefing, it is a disaster considering following loss of live stocks, equipments, and furnitures...i am totally agree every manufacture has to stand behind their product but to be fair, they didnt instruct us to put the tank where it will damage our stuffs or whatever live stock we must buy.
Alrite, lets say you buy a backpack. And you broke the handle somehow then drops on the ground with your laptop in it. Are you going to sue jansport or whatever company making it when your laptop is damaged?
Besides when we try to put so much liability to these tank makers after these disasters, we are also telling them "hey man, you should not make any tank anymore because you might have to pay me back 10x or 100x you just make from me!" How much do you think cadlight put in their pocket from your tank 500? Maybe 1000? Or little more. And obviously they didnt do this on purpose. I mean they did try their best i assume. Every tank maker has different craftsmanship skill. Thats why reef savvy is far more superior, and elos is just a LV in reefing. We must think carefully and ahead if any of these disasters may come to us. Building a nice drain floor around it or whatever will put our stuffs safe like organize a fish room. I saw one from MrSaltwaterTank video. Its awsome. The money we put has a trade off. Thats why ecotech selling backup battery or you gonna sue smud or pg&e for killing your livestock? I mean this hobby has a crazy cost.
Last i think Cadlight still need to responsible for their mistake but not all the damages it caused. Maybe a new tank or a refund the cost of the tank.
Again I am not trying to defend anyone. I am trying to understand both sides. Please dont try to scare these tank makers, we need them, but on the other hand they also need to be fair to stand behind their own product.

 

[SoloGarth]

Yeah I agree. This is indeed a nightmare. I think that their "warranty" terms are total BS but that's why it is important to read them. Personally I wouldn't have ordered a tank from them after reading that. But to me the main thing to keep in mind is that there is inherent risk in installing these systems in our homes. They are massive, heavy, complex and can potentially cause a disaster. Acts of God pare generally not covered under warranty . . .

All that said I do think the manufacture should be far more accommodating to the OP especially when considering how many people are likely to view these threads. I would be beyond furious if my tank suddenly had the front panel pop off.

 

[dodgerblew]

I agree mistakes in manufacturing occur in all products but this isn't your run of the mill "my tank sprung a leak thread", this is an egregious and negligent manufacturing defect. If this was your car and a catastrophic defect in the manufacturing of the car caused the car to say lose its brakes and slam through the wall of your garage or another car causing major property damage and possible injury would you be satisfied with a resolution of we will take care of your car but the rest is on you or your insurance?

 

[CoralsAddiction]

I agree mistakes in manufacturing occur in all products but this isn't your run of the mill "my tank sprung a leak thread", this is an egregious and negligent manufacturing defect. If this was your car and a catastrophic defect in the manufacturing of the car caused the car to say lose its brakes and slam through the wall of your garage or another car causing major property damage and possible injury would you be satisfied with a resolution of we will take care of your car but the rest is on you or your insurance?

Well said. 4 months of living in a hotel as a result of this defect sounds like more than enough pain and suffering to me.

 

[pciscott]

Eddie how you deal with these types of problems that arise in any company defines you as a business. Your warranty has nothing to do with building a custom tank and you should have product liability insurance that would have handled this mess. Also how did your lack of inspection or approval let that panel pop clean off? I would say lack of Engineering and why Lemar would not build my tank the same height might have something to do with it? Anyway I would get a Lawyer and ask him a few questions because hiding behind your warranty does not lessen your exposure and my advice would be to settle with Ivan and your integrity will get you back on the good side of the community. We will see on Friday, and your loss of business will be brutal if you lose your customers trust. Do the right thing!

 

[pciscott]

Lemar stopped building custom tanks because they only were getting less than 1/4 follow through on custom orders because of cheaper competition and building large tanks is much more work than many of the same size. Design and Engineering on these tanks was time and money. I am glad that I did go with Lemar though and they did tell me that I could not have my tank as tall as I vans without 2 extra cross braces do to Engineering. I sure hope Cad lights Engineers these monsters because if they do not and this fact comes up in discovery they could pay punitive, Ivan has not been the same since he lost his fish of 10 years!

 

[Wolfex]

Being part of this community our hearts went out to Ivan in this unfortunate situation and we did everything in our power to help him. We constructed this tank and it left the warehouse in 2012, ordered by a third party. When he called us in 2014 regarding the same tank that was not installed by us in his house we tried to help him out as best we could by offering him the following:

"¢Build a new replacement tank.

"¢Repair current tank.

"¢Refund the cost of tank to customer.


Unfortunately we cannot cover this under our custom aquarium warranty due to the following reasons:

"¢The stand was not constructed, inspected, or approved by us.

"¢The installation was not overseen, inspected, or approved by us.

"¢The plumbing was not overseen, inspected, or approved by us.


These reasons void the warranty. We sympathize and care for our community and customers deeply; this is why we tried to go above and beyond what is expected of us to help. We stand by our products and even though we had no hand in the installation or construction of the cabinetry we still stepped forward to do our best to assist the customer. We have offered these three options but he declined all of our offers. We're a small company; our work is for the passion of the hobby and the growth of the community.

-Ed

This company sounds nasty. In the wording all you would have to do is invite the company over to inspect the stand, installation, and plumbing. What if the company declined to inspect? Would the warranty still be valid or invalid then?
Anyway from the failure mechanism it doesn't look like any of these were a factor in the failure and it is probably in the manufacturing process. And just because a statement is in a warranty doesn't make it legal in all states. Hope you get a good consumer protection lawyer to sort it all out. I'll be sure to put this company on my warning list.

 

[ReefPharmer]

@wadhi tanks aren't backpacks. You may or may not have a laptop in the backpack but you will have a lot of water in the tank that's designed to hold this water in the room where it's set up. No manufacturer states that tanks are designed to hold water only in basements w a drain in case of a blowout.
The issue is whether the blowout was just an accident (which do happen) or a result of negligent craftsmanship. If it's an accident w no fault, I don't see how cad is liable for damage. If it's negligence, they should be liable.

As Rik stated, there is case law on negligent manufacturing practices being held accountable for damage. If your pet or relative was sitting there and got killed by that glass due to negligence, you'd be cool with a new tank ? (Fish are considered pets last time I checked)

Again I'm not saying cad was negligent here, as we do not know all the facts but just from OP statements

 

[Mr. Brooks]

Was there a center brace on this tank? Any cross bracing at all?

 

[Reefer22153]

My CAD Lights tank experienced the same fate. I came home to the same scene and was absolutely beside myself, and it was only a 22-gallon. I just cannot fathom what your family had to endure. I sincerely sympathize.

 

[1panman1]

I think we are all so passionate about this issue because it could happen to any of us. We all are concerned about who is responsible and who is not. I copied from the Cadlights website their warranty so we can all see it and discuss it intelligently. It would be interesting to compare warranties from the other tank manufacturers. I tried to look at Visio's and Elos's websites but could not find their warranties posted.

SHORTAGES/DAMAGED SHIPMENTS:

PLEASE OPEN AND INSPECT ALL PACKAGES AND MERCHANDISE UPON ARRIVAL. Inspection report of physical damage is invalid if aquarium is filled with water or put into use such as chips, scratches etc. (excludes leaks or joint failure which is fully warrantied). Even if there is no outside damage on the shipping carton, this is to check for any concealed damage. C.A.D Lighting co. must be notified within 24hrs after receipt of your order for any shortages or damages. ALL shipments are fully insured so it is important to keep all packing and shipping cartons in case of any inspections required by the carrier. All damages will be replaced by the same item at the discretion of CAD Lighting. Sorry, NO subs on damaged items.

DEFECTIVE ITEMS:

C.A.D Lighting co. will provide a limited warranty for one year on the craftsmanship, seams and joints of the aquariums and circuitry of our products from the original date of purchase. This warranty DOES NOT include Physical damage to the aquarium glass itself, bulbs or internal pumps. Nor does the warranty imply or cover abuse, misuse, tampering, modifications or improper installation of any product manufactured by C.A.D Lighting co. Returns on defective items must also call to obtain a RA # before shipping and must be sent via insured method. Items found to be defective shall be repaired or replaced at the discretion of C.A.D Lighting co. all defective claims MUST be supported by dated photos and original purchase invoice. C.A.D. Lighting co. will then cover the defective part and we will prepare one for you at no charge for the replacement, customer will only be responsible for shipping charges. CUSTOM AQUARIUM WARRANTY *If aquarium cabinet/structure is not built by us or inspected or approved by us, warranty of the aquarium is void. *This warranty is limited to replacement of the aquarium and does not cover fish loss, personal injury, property loss or direct, incidental or consequential damage arising out of use of this aquarium. * Our custom made aquariums are warrantied for up to 1 year. * Chipping, breakage, seam damage after the aquarium has been picked up from our warehouse or accepted by delivery, voids warranty. * Installation of plumbing that is more intricate or more complex than standard drain and return lines with various SCHEDULED PVC, flexible tubing etc. (schematics need approval)