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View Full Version : How could this happen!?!?!


mystic7
04/19/2006, 06:47 AM
What a nightmare yesterday. Everything was fine until about 9 a.m. Suddenly I hear this grinding noise coming from downstairs. When I went to investigate I saw that my floor was soaking wet and my sump was empty! Somehow, for no reason, one of my return flow tubes detached itself from the t-valve leading from my return pump! Now, not only was the tube tightly fitted onto the t-valve, but I had it thoroughly siliconed into place. Besides that the tube runs along the edge of my sump, so it was supported as well. It wasn't the weight of the tube that pulled it away from the t-valve. What a disaster!

I had to replace about 15 gallons of water with fresh, tap water (no salt handy). I was using 2 pitchers and when I reached the water level in my sump I forgot that I still had water running into the other pitcher, which of course spilled over, but not into the sink, but onto the backsplash, causing another major spill I had to clean up. GRRRRR!!!!! Then, while trying to wash the towels I used to soak up the water on the floor, the washer filled with water but didn't go into wash cycle, so I had to pull the now thoroughly soaked towels out of the washer and hang them outside, ringing them with my bare hands to try and dry them out.

Needless to say, as badly as I needed a shower after all that, I stayed away from water for the rest of the day!

No moral to this story. Just wanted to share in case any of you thought YOU had a bad day!

P.S. All fish are doing fine, surprisingly. Even with the 15 gallons of fresh water my salinity was still at 1.021.

rooroo
04/19/2006, 06:59 AM
Hehe, a small moral to the story is have salt handy.

Sorry that had to happen to you. So far I've had no major floods (knock on wood).

Hope the rest of the day is better for you.

dfreeman
04/19/2006, 07:44 AM
Was it connected with pvc glue? or just pressed together? All the return pipes will work loose under pressure after awhile. I tried to press some tubing and use silocone but it leaked bad enough that I went a different route.
Dewayne

Bathel
04/19/2006, 08:45 AM
doesn't sound like you used PVC glue. The vibration and pressure will eventually cause it to fail unless you connnect the PVC together the proper way. (USE PVC GLUE)

CarmieJo
04/19/2006, 08:58 AM
Sorry for your bad day. You are not alone on water disasters! I once pumped about 15 gallons of SW that I was mixing out onto my carpet. That took about 2 seconds! Cleaning up took about 2 hours. :)

:fish1:

ricks
04/19/2006, 09:48 AM
Funny how water seeks the lowest level.... Think we have all been there, or are going there....

Good Luck..

mystic7
04/19/2006, 09:52 AM
Ah yes, misery loves company :)

I have rubber (vinyl?) tubing, not PVC. It is situated in such a way that one would have to manually pull on it to detach it from the t-valve, hence my surprise that it happened.

Yes, CarmieJo, my mishap also probably took no more than 15 seconds to happen, but a lot longer than 2 hours to clean up thanks to my second mishap in the kitchen, and then the washing machine incident. Altogether about 5 hours! I see you're also in NC. No wonder the state has been so salty lately ;)

Sk8r
04/19/2006, 10:02 AM
Ow! Use c-clamps for hose connection---they're what holds the car hoses on under pressure. You can get plastic ones.

mg426
04/19/2006, 11:43 AM
Sorry to hear about your misfortune, I admit to having a couple floods of my own LOL

mystic7
04/19/2006, 04:08 PM
Yeah, I've been thinking about c clamps. Definitely before I go away for any period of time!