Been lurking around here for quite some time to get ideas for my first reef tank. Looking to purchase a Red Sea Reefer 450 and am trying to plan ahead for the build. As we all know, it’s not if your tank will leak but when. With redundancy being an integral part of this hobby, aside from emergency overflows on the system, has anyone planed for leaks outside of the system? i.e. hidden/low profile floor drain? Any input, ideas, or pictures would be appreciated. Planning to put the tank in a 1st floor tiled living room and would like to keep things aesthetically pleasing while having some sort of backup should the fecal matter hit the oscillator.
Hidden Emergency Floor Drain?
- Thread starter SmokeEater542
- Start date
- Tagged users None
Brew12
Electrical Gru
I always have a back up plan.
In case of a major leak, I keep enough in emergency funds to send my wife to the beach for 3 days while I clean up the mess.
There isn't a drain made that will keep up with a major aquarium failure.
Haha thanks for the suggestion! I realize that during a major failure a mess cannot be adverted and may just have to adopt your emergency plan! A normal size floor drain wouldn’t instantly take care of an issue however my thought is that draining water is better than standing water. I’m just looking for some casualty control and some piece of mind for my wife as this will be above our soon to be finished basement.
All depends on the floor where you place the tank. If it's not in the basement, if it's on first/second floor - water will instantly go through wood floor/carpet & through the subfloor. I know... I had to fix the basement once already.
nautical_nathaniel
Indecision may or may not be my problem.
Smart man.
Erica-Renee
Valuable Member
talk to your insurance agent id the best solution.. but you can put a floor drain on the floor under or next to that tank to help minimize the damage of a major failure.It also might help lower the cost of adding the tank to your home owners insurance policy. if you rent its prob a Super great ideal to have insurance to cover it..
Yup that’s exactly what I’m trying to avoid since it doesn’t sound like too much fun to deal with. Tank will be in a soon to be tiled 1st floor living room.
Welcome to R2R!! 
Assuming you do install a floor drain, a small leak will likely be noticed. In a major failure, water is still going everywhere regardless of floor drain. I rely on leak detectors to warn me of a leak, both behind the tank and in the sump area.
Assuming you do install a floor drain, a small leak will likely be noticed. In a major failure, water is still going everywhere regardless of floor drain. I rely on leak detectors to warn me of a leak, both behind the tank and in the sump area.
