12 hours into a power outage with no end in sight.

[Anonymous]

How long until I am screwed?

Right now I have a pathetic battery operated air stone bubbling away in a 100 gallon reef tank.

 

[Anonymous]

You can mannualy move the water. Make some sort of paddle and get it moving or pour it in from a height. I like the paddle better though - you could use a plate.

Hows the heat?

 

[brandonberry]

You might be surprised how much help that air stone will be. I'd just do do the paddle thing every hour or so to drive any mucous off the corals. I guess finding a generator is out of the question?

 

[Anonymous]

Been there done that.

Got a hand mixer? Mix the tank up for 10 minutes every hour. Keep the heat up. Keep beer on hand.

B

 

[mr_X]

i heard a spoonful of hydrogen peroxide every so often would do as well. anyone heard of this?

 

[Anonymous]

5 am the power came on and I "awoke" from a sleepless night. Female maroon is almost comatose at the bottom of the tank. I hope she will be ok as it warms up. Lots of coral mucus and other crap floating around. Lights and heater are now going to have to do a lot to warm 100 gallons from 68F to 77F. I finally won my struggle to keep the darn thing under 80F, and then this.

In retrospect, a generator is a good investment. No UPS could have kept this thing going for almost 20 hours.

Well, I only pay $200 a month for electricity.


:roll:


The last time I had a serious blackout was when Enron was turning our lights off.

 

[Anonymous]

i heard a spoonful of hydrogen peroxide every so often would do as well. anyone heard of this?

NO, but this is the functional equivalent of adding ozone, but much safer. It would help by keeping the oxidation level up in an oxygen-starved system.

 

[Anonymous]

I'm wondering if I should let my pump suck air to oxygenate it quickly?

 

[Anonymous]

SM- Get yourself a little hand-held Honda generator. The problem with generators is that the are big, noisy and stinky which is difficult if you have small quarters.

I have a Honda, and while big generator users might sneer at the small output, it easily ran my main Sequence pump and a heater through a couple of long outages. It should be plenty if all you need is to support the tank. Small, easy to carry around, starts with a flick of the wrist, and is quiet.

 

[Anonymous]

I keep thinking about getting a 500V power inverter.

It should be plenty to run a pump, and when the battery gets low I'll just run the car for a little while. I have a deep cycle battery on the truck, it should hold charge for a while just running a small pump and maybe a heater.

 

[Anonymous]

SM- Get yourself a little hand-held Honda generator. The problem with generators is that the are big, noisy and stinky which is difficult if you have small quarters.

I have a Honda, and while big generator users might sneer at the small output, it easily ran my main Sequence pump and a heater through a couple of long outages. It should be plenty if all you need is to support the tank. Small, easy to carry around, starts with a flick of the wrist, and is quiet.

Link or photo or something? Sounds like a good idea.

 

[Anonymous]

http://www.hondapowerequipment.com/Mode ... me=eu1000i

 

[Anonymous]

This it?

http://www.hondapowerequipment.com/Mode ... me=eu1000i

 

[Anonymous]

Might get yourself some change water ready in case you get a spike.

 

[trido]

This it?

http://www.hondapowerequipment.com/Mode ... me=eu1000i

If you can afford any of the EU series honda generators you wont be dissapointed. EXTREMELY quiet.

Youd be suprised how far 800 watts with a power inverter or generator can be stretched during a power outage. You can easily run a mag 18 and 500 watts of heaters with power to spare.
Last time, I even ran a 250 MH so we had light to read by.

I hope your tank recovers with no losses.

 

[Anonymous]

you could also buy a vortec and a battery backup. they'll last around 24 hours.

but with the genny you can also keep your food from going bad. . .

B

 

[brandonberry]

Although it may have been stressful to see your temp go to 68 degrees, that may have helped save a lot of your stuff as well. I would imagine the decreased temp should have allowed for a greater saturation of oxygen and slowed down the metabloism of the organisms to allow less consumption.

 

[LA-Lawman]

those honda gens are cool. they have an eco throttle. if you do not need the max load, then the things adjusts the throttle for fuel conservation. i have two of them.

i link them together. i got almost 10hrs on a tank the last outage i had..... on 6/10 of a gallon. that is outstanding!

 

[Anonymous]

Although it may have been stressful to see your temp go to 68 degrees, that may have helped save a lot of your stuff as well. I would imagine the decreased temp should have allowed for a greater saturation of oxygen and slowed down the metabloism of the organisms to allow less consumption.

+1

A temp dip that low is not that big a deal, and may even be beneficial in a way. Much better than a temp spike in the other direction, that's for sure. Oxygen deprivation is the main issue, so aerating and moving water manually are the best things you can do.

 

[Anonymous]

i heard a spoonful of hydrogen peroxide every so often would do as well. anyone heard of this?

Yes, I sure have. Great suggestion! When I've been in this situation (post earthquake) what I did was get some pitchers and pour the water from a height into the tank several times, as well as poured water into my filter and did some exchanging that way.

Dave and I have dived tropical areas where the temps at some depth was easily 68F. Unfortunately, those areas don't experience large fluctuations, that would be my biggest concern.

For future reference, you might want to have some chemical heat packs on hand (they're used for shipping during winter months). Be sure to get those that stay warm for 24hrs +.