Question about plumbing connection

cainer · Feb 9, 2018

One month ago I had a failure of my external return pump in my 120 gallon tank. I panicked and called on an aquarium maintenance service I was not familiar with to help me replace my external return pump. He recommended a submersible pump placed in the sump instead of replacing my external return pump. I have attached a picture of the connector he used to route the water from the sump to the main tank. I have never seen metal used in saltwater plumbing but I assumed he knew what he was doing. A month later all my corals have died - fish are okay but water looks cloudy and a lot of detritus in the tank (die off?)
I think the metal used in the connection for the return water may be leaching metals into my tank. I attached a picture. Ideas? Is my tank salvageable?

TangingOut · Feb 9, 2018

Yeah, that's not good. Is this guy also a car mechanic? Looks like something you would see in an engine bay.

cracker · Feb 9, 2018

So the metal fittings are submerged ? If so ,not good .

Mal11224 · Feb 9, 2018

Sorry buddy. That is not good at all. Should try to get that out of there as soon as possible. May also need to send your water for testing as well.

mjlash22 · Feb 10, 2018

If the fitting you are referring to is the metal coupler between the two yellow tighteners, you should replace with a PVC piece. Who knows what type of metal it is and what it could be leaching into your tank.

Wildblue4 · Feb 10, 2018

Sorry that’s terrible. I would go PVC. They have tube connectors with barbed ends.

Jeepguy242 · Feb 10, 2018

TangingOut said:
Yeah, that's not good. Is this guy also a car mechanic? Looks like something you would see in an engine bay.

only a hack car mechanic would use that....

their are proper fittings we use to fix cars

definitely get that out of your tank....

cainer · Mar 1, 2018

Thanks to everyone for the input. I removed the internal pump and associated connections. Some of the metal was turning green which I suspect was leaching copper into the tank. I now have an external pump setup properly. 2 weeks of running polyfilters and copusorb seems to be working. My button corals are opening up and to my surprise my zoas are coming back.