ATO Failure

[CanadianReefer]

Hi folks,
My ATO failed. Still trying to figure out how given that it has built in redundancy. Nonetheless, it did. Thankfully I'm at home today so I noticed it right before it would have started flooding, but not before it dropped my salinity from 1.026 to 1.023.

My question is how slowly should I raise my salinity back up? I don't want to harm my fish or corals.

 

[BigJim]

I would recommend raising it slowly, but how slowly depends on what is in your tank. If you have only fish and soft corals, 1.023 will not hurt them and you can just let your normal water changes raise the salinity. If you keep a lot of SPS and LPS corals, you probably want to get it up to at least 1.025 within a week or so but still do it over the course of multiple water changes. My concern would be more about the alkalinity swing than the salinity.

 

[Brew12]

Hi folks,
My ATO failed. Still trying to figure out how given that it has built in redundancy. Nonetheless, it did. Thankfully I'm at home today so I noticed it right before it would have started flooding, but not before it dropped my salinity from 1.026 to 1.023.

My question is how slowly should I raise my salinity back up? I don't want to harm my fish or corals.

Personally, I would just let evaporation run its course to return things to normal if that is an option.

 

[CanadianReefer]

Good point. I'll check my alkalinity level. It is a mixed reef - LPS and SPS. I like a good challenge lol.

Will my SPS suffer at 1.023?? It's a 300g system, so it will take a great deal of salt or water changes to raise it back up. Not sure how long allowing evaporation to raise it would take. Any ideas??

 

[Brew12]

Good point. I'll check my alkalinity level. It is a mixed reef - LPS and SPS. I like a good challenge lol.

Will my SPS suffer at 1.023?? It's a 300g system, so it will take a great deal of salt or water changes to raise it back up. Not sure how long allowing evaporation to raise it would take. Any ideas??

If you know how much water you added, and how much you evaporate in a day, it should be easy. I know my 120g DT goes through 10 gallons in 7 days.

 

[BigJim]

Personally, I would just let evaporation run its course to return things to normal if that is an option.

That is also a good option. Just remember to top off with saltwater or do a water change before putting the ATO back on line.

 

[reefguy565]

when you saying it failed what did it exactly do? you might be helping a lot of people out from this thread.

 

[BigJim]

Good point. I'll check my alkalinity level. It is a mixed reef - LPS and SPS. I like a good challenge lol.

Will my SPS suffer at 1.023?? It's a 300g system, so it will take a great deal of salt or water changes to raise it back up. Not sure how long allowing evaporation to raise it would take. Any ideas??

I have been at 1.024 when I was too lazy to calibrate by refractometer and I had no issues. I just had to us more 2 part when it was that low to keep calcium and alk steady.

 

[3mm3]

Hi folks,
My ATO failed. Still trying to figure out how given that it has built in redundancy. Nonetheless, it did. Thankfully I'm at home today so I noticed it right before it would have started flooding, but not before it dropped my salinity from 1.026 to 1.023.

My question is how slowly should I raise my salinity back up? I don't want to harm my fish or corals.

Like @Brew12 mentioned I would let it evaporate back to desired salinity.
But FIRST drain out enough water from system immediately to prevent flooding in case of power failure. (assuming you have a sump of some sort)
Also how is your ato setup?
Do you have a sump?

 

[CanadianReefer]

when you saying it failed what did it exactly do? you might be helping a lot of people out from this thread.

I have the autotopoff.com version for my ATO system. I've used them with good results in my other tanks. It has the regular level shut off, and then an emergency shut off (basically it has 2 float switches - the 2nd is for redundancy).

I've always used their system with 5g ATO buckets with the idea that it would never flood anything if it failed (it would simply run the pump dry).

I hadn't installed an ATO on my 300g system initially because I was trying to decide how I wanted to do it now that I have a sump that is in my fish room beside both my RODI system and my large freshwater brute container. Additionally, with a system this large, the little 5g containers simply wouldn't work.

I researched hooking it up to the RODI system but decided against it because I didn't want it to have a continuous supply of water in case it failed (good thing, as it turns out). I decided to hook it into my freshwater container. Though technically it would have a continuous water supply, I placed it in such a fashion that after 20g, it would drop below the intake and would need to wait till the bucket filled back up to continue. The idea behind it was that it would slow down it's access to the water giving us more time to spot an issue.

I really don't know how it failed. I was just discussing this with my husband. We believe it was either the pump itself that malfunctioned or that it had to do with too much pressure forcing it throw the aqua lifter. The emergency float switch had triggered and yet water was still being pumped in.

I figure I'm going to move the entry into the brute container to be higher up - its just a matter of finding the sweet spot between my evaporation rate and the time it takes to refill the freshwater container. That, or perhaps I'll cave and buy a more expensive ATO, such as the Tunze that has a laser level as a back up.

I'm also open to suggestions.

 

[CanadianReefer]

Like @Brew12 mentioned I would let it evaporate back to desired salinity.
But FIRST drain out enough water from system immediately to prevent flooding in case of power failure. (assuming you have a sump of some sort)
Also how is your ato setup?
Do you have a sump?

I disconnected the ATO system so that I could figure out what happened. Yes, I have an 80g sump.

 

[3mm3]

I have the autotopoff.com version for my ATO system. I've used them with good results in my other tanks. It has the regular level shut off, and then an emergency shut off (basically it has 2 float switches - the 2nd is for redundancy).

I really don't know how it failed. I was just discussing this with my husband. We believe it was either the pump itself that malfunctioned or that it had to do with too much pressure forcing it throw the aqua lifter. The emergency float switch had triggered and yet water was still being pumped in.

QUOTE]

That is a great ato. Used them for many years. Sounds like you have your fresh water higher than you have the sump and caused a siphon.
I would use a peristaltic pump vs the aqualifter.

 

[CanadianReefer]

That is a great ato. Used them for many years. Sounds like you have your fresh water higher than you have the sump and caused a siphon.
I would use a peristaltic pump vs the aqualifter.

We figured this is likely what happened as well. Good suggestion on the pump i have a couple lying around that aren't in use - I'll do that too. Thanks

 

[3mm3]

We figured this is likely what happened as well. Good suggestion on the pump i have a couple lying around that aren't in use - I'll do that too. Thanks

If you do get a peristaltic pump the Milwaukee pump has been very reliable for me However fair warning the house will know its on.
http://www.milwaukeeinst.com/site/component/content/article/256

I used to use the brs pumps but got tired of replacing them every year.
Also can find some great pumps from hospital inventory on ebay once in a while.

 

[Dom]

Hi folks,
My ATO failed. Still trying to figure out how given that it has built in redundancy. Nonetheless, it did. Thankfully I'm at home today so I noticed it right before it would have started flooding, but not before it dropped my salinity from 1.026 to 1.023.

My question is how slowly should I raise my salinity back up? I don't want to harm my fish or corals.

I'm guessing that your ATO failed in a way where it didn't shut off? This would cause greater water volume and as a result, a drop in salinity. Is this what happened? If so, I would say that through evaporation, your salinity would come up once you've repaired the ATO.

 

[dutch27]

Salinity from 26 to 23 isn't a very big deal, I wouldn't worry about how fast or slow you bring it back up. When something like this happens I generally just get it right at the next regularly scheduled water change.

Best fail safe I ever installed for my ATO was setting it up on a timer via controller. Figure out the average amount of time it takes to fill/turn itself off, then put it on a timer for once a day for that time plus some extra; I evap more in the winter so this covers me all year round. I have a smaller tank and I run it for 25 seconds once a day. This way, no matter what the error, the ATO system gets shut down after 25 seconds. This has saved me a couple of times.

 

[CanadianReefer]

If you do get a peristaltic pump the Milwaukee pump has been very reliable for me However fair warning the house will know its on.
http://www.milwaukeeinst.com/site/component/content/article/256

I used to use the brs pumps but got tired of replacing them every year.
Also can find some great pumps from hospital inventory on ebay once in a while.

I have a few of the BRS pumps lying around, so I'll use those for now but I'll look at upgrading them when the time comes. I had initially used them for dosing, but when I had a large alk spike, I realized that they weren't as accurate as they claim to be, so I disconnected them.

For this purpose, they should work well enough for now

 

[Rakie]

Good point. I'll check my alkalinity level. It is a mixed reef - LPS and SPS. I like a good challenge lol.

Will my SPS suffer at 1.023?? It's a 300g system, so it will take a great deal of salt or water changes to raise it back up. Not sure how long allowing evaporation to raise it would take. Any ideas??

I'm gonna let you know something here about SPS and low salinity...

My stupid story: You see, I was very, very lazy.. And never calibrated my refractometer. I was lead to believe you rarely need to check them, and that sounded like a nice lazy solution so I went with it. Fast forward a year later, my salinity in a seemingly thriving SPS reef is 1.020 -- not a typo. So while my water slowly slid down to 1.020, I had noticed some corals ever so slowing losing a little color. I had a couple near deaths, literally just a few. So when I realized I was stupid, and my SG was way off... I raised it to 1.0265, over the course of about a week.

After calibration and verification of SG, I raised my sg by 0.001 per day. By the time I had gotten back to 1.0265. Most things looked better -- But the few things that had been not too thrilled with the low SG, were less than happy with another change so suddenly.

What I suggest: So anything that's more sensitive may get upset with increased SG at when increasing by even as little as 0.001 per day. If you can manage... I would do an increase of 0.0005 per day. I know all the zeroes make it sound complicated. But really just use some salt water to top off your tank. If you have nice SPS, the last thing you want is to see is them pale out and start to STN / RTN because you're getting parameters back where they should be... That's a total kick in the butt AFTER the fact..

So to put a point on it... I had more coral deaths from raising SG back up, than from leaving it low. At low sg, 2 corals paled out. While raising sg by 0.001 per day, I had about 8 coral deaths. From mini colonies to little sticks.

So adjust slowly, and good luck!