Floods: what happened, lessons learned, what do you differently now?

[andylee]

I've had 3 major floods in my reefing career.

1. Left my RODI running into a five gallon bucket and went out with the wife and kids. Came back to find kitchen flooded and a section of the basement ceiling collapsed. Lesson learned : always use a float valve.

2. RODI fitting came loose while we were on vacation. Flooded the whole house! The unit had been up and running for years, so I don't know what exactly happened. Lesson learned: I always close the valve to the RODI when going awayfor more than a day. For longer vacations, I turn off the main water supply to the house.

3. ATO float switch got stuck. I had put extra water into my reservoir and was messing with the sump before rushing to the airport for a work trip. When I checked my messages after arriving in San Francisco, there was a hysterical message from my wife. Fortunately, I had jokingly told my friend he was on-call while I was away. My wife had to call him at midnight to stop the top off and gradually correct the resulting hyposalinity. Lesson learned : no major changes to the sump or tank before going away. Only add enough water to the reservoir so that sump and tank won't overflow (but I haven't gone away since that incident) .

Anyone else willing to fess up?

 

[emmanuel]

#1 I do weekly its a good thing its in a basement
I installed a sump to my red sea max and made sure the sump wont overflow if power shut off also made sure the pump chamber had just enough water so if the diy overflow ever lost siphon the tank wouldn't overflow but I left the air intake hose too long on a skimmer hanging outside the sump so when my temporary pump shorted and tripped the gfi the air line siphoned out the sump all over the floor

 

[BaaMNYC]

Had my hob skimmer in my DT located above an outlet. Skimmer acted up and overflowed all over the outlet and nearly caused a fire and woke up to water all over my floor and a burned out outlet with scorch marks on the wall.

Decided to put a skimmer in my sump instead and got rid of my hob skimmer. Problem solved.

 

[Silverni2]

Basement is key!!!!
Many of you guys are in the city so basements are not available. Putting my tank in my basement made my house bigger! My kids now go down the basement on a regular basis to hang out with me while watching tv and the tank.
I spill water on a regular basis while changing water or some unforseen accident which is inevitable IMHO!

 

[andylee]

Being in the basement is helpful. Another thing I did after the RODI disaster is put a RODI downstairs. However, my new tank setup is on the main floor!

 

[NewfiDog]

Everything of mine is in the basement, but the DT is in a finished room. My RODI is over a sump pit but i never leave it on ive seen so much damage from the push fittings i would never leave mine on.

 

[ecvernon]

I have had different parts of my ro di system fail on me. Once the float valve got stuck and also once one of the fittings were leaking. I live in an apartment and have carpet in the area so it was a lot to clean up. Now I bought a leak detector and some leak frog alarms to shut off ro di flow when there is a leak

 

[rambler67]

guilty of #1 to many times luckily my ro set up is n the garage.

 

[reefs4life]

The fact that mine is in the basement as well is definitely helpful...also the way I have it set up is that my electronic float valve actually opens a solenoid valve so there isn't water in the RO/DI at all times, it's like when water is needed the system turns on the water to the RO/DI not the outlet of the RO/DI

Before that though when we live in an private house apartment on the second floor I used rely on a kent float valve in a 20G garbage can in the kitchen and a few times I can home to a wet floor, luckily never went away for too long or it would definitely be flooded on the first floor lol

 

[NL146]

I left my ro/di unit running, connected to the kitchen tap with an adapter, and went out with the wife. We came back home to see a sign on the front door from the super that he had to enter the apartment because the kitchen sink had overflowed and made a mess of the apartment below us. The problem was that the water pressure forced the adapter off and the sink stopper was in. The sink overflowed. There was water even in the cupboard drawers. After that I installed the ro/di inline with the water main. Lesson - adapters can fail so plan for that.

Another time that wasn't as bad - I had installed a float valve in a bucket that I left filling overnight. The next morning the bucket had overflowed. The problem was that I had set the valve with the bucket open and then covered it because I don't like the idea of open water containers around with the little one. Covering it forced the valve open. Lesson - always leave wiggle room.

 

[evoIX_Reefer]

I have flooded mine several times with my RODI in the past. I just kept mine in the sink utilizing a faucet adapter and if it spills over. Right in the sink drain.

For the tank, I purchased a water leak sensor from AUTOTOPOFF.COM.

If it detects a leak, it shuts off all power. I have tested and retested my ATO and power outages so I should be fine. The only problem is when or if it does flood my skimmer goes haywire and bubbles begin to fly everywhere causing water splash which can get out of hand if away for a long period.

 

[turbotone]

before i got a 40 gallon drum and float valve installed i use to fill up a 5 gallon jug.... smh never got to that jug in time lol my wife made me get the upgrade... she got tired of me taking the cloths and towels out the hamper for quick absorbing lol

 

[MatthewScars]

Left RODI running and went to sleep.

Now I use a kitchen timer every single time I touch my rodi

 

[andylee]

Looks like RODI and forgetfulness are the big culprits.

 

[nybb1001]

I just flooded my floor last night when I was trying to replenish the evaporation, but forgot to turn of the rodi, there should be more than 30 gallons of tank water went down the crawl space over the night, through the hard wood floor. So my question is, how should I clean the water on the floor and under the stand? Should I wash the joists and subfloor from the crawl space with fresh water?

 

[andylee]

Where do you think the water is now? Is it sitting on the ceiling of the floor below? If so, you'd better get it out, even if it means drilling a hole in the ceiling. If you have access to the crawl space, I would get it out as best as possible and then put high-powered fans to dry it all out. Next thing you know, there will be a mold problem.

 

[nybb1001]

Where do you think the water is now? Is it sitting on the ceiling of the floor below? If so, you'd better get it out, even if it means drilling a hole in the ceiling. If you have access to the crawl space, I would get it out as best as possible and then put high-powered fans to dry it all out. Next thing you know, there will be a mold problem.

The crawl space has no dry wall ceiling, the water went through the hard wood floor and went to the sewer directly (the floor of the crawl space is cement). Now I just worry about the hard wood floor, the subwood and the joists under the floor, should I wash them with fresh water?

 

[andylee]

When I had my big flood, the joists were OK, but the hardwood floor upstairs warped badly and had to be replaced. It was much more water volume though; it was probably a good two days of water flow; we were out of town.

 

[motortrendz]

i live on a second floor condo with my coral tanks in my loft... i have a 35g garbage can i use for water changes.. i started filling the pail and forgot abt it and left for a few hours.. came home to water running thru my light fixture in the kitchen and flooding it.. water everywhere in the loft and discolored my downstairs neibors kitchen ceiling.

... aaaannd just today somehow the garbage can (full of fresh ro water) i must have left a 3/4" hose laying in the can attached to a pump which was not on somehow fell out of the tank and created a syphon and drained 3/4 of the can and once again water running into my kitchen.. but i got the shopvac and all the towels i could find and saved the neighbors.. lol

i thought i was the only one with water floods.. haha

btw theres abt 6 other times... but all similar..