Rough day in the Red Sea department

[clownfishsticks]

I have a 2ish week old 250 reefer. I have a reef run 5500 return pump and a red sea 300 skimmer.

While at work doing a 24 hour shift two days ago my wife text me that there is water leaking from our sump cabinet onto the floor. Fantastic. I tell her to turn off the return pump and skimmer (which has the new sensor and failed to turn itself off). This stops the leak.

Today I had a chance to try to figure it out. There is an error code on my reef beat app saying that the impeller is stuck and it needs attention. This is what caused the leak. The return pump stopped, the sump filled up with water and the higher water level made the skimmer overflow, again, despite the new sensor.

I have completely disassembled the pump, the impeller is freely spinning and feels great. It's 2 weeks old, brand new, and looks that way. I tried cleaning the ... perfectly clean impeller. I deleted it from the reef beat app, swapped its place with the skimmer on the reef go controller, etc. No dice.

I'm waiting to hear back from my LFS who helped me set all of it up, but in the mean time has anyone had this impeller issue? Any advice (outside of normal impeller advice) on how to fix it? I'm pretty sure its a faulty pump given its so new but Sicce has treated me well for about 2 decades now so I'm trying to give it the benefit of the doubt.

 

[jda]

This will happen again in some form or fashion, wether it be a snail or just a total pump failure. Be sure and drill a anit-siphon break in your return line. If the sump is too small with no back flow from the return line, then you are going to have a lot of problems.

 

[clownfishsticks]

So what actually made the “leak” was that the rubber drain line from the skimmer collection cup acted as a conduit for the overflowing skimmer water. It has since been fixed. I do have an anti siphon system in place and the skimmer could have taken an additional 3+ gallons without leaking, as intended. Thank you for looking out.

 

[Graemesreef]

Did anything actually made by red sea cause your issue?

 

[clownfishsticks]

Did anything actually made by red sea cause your issue?

My red sea return pump appears to be faulty after 2 weeks unless anyone has ideas I haven't thought of yet. And also my sensor that is supposed to prevent the red sea skimmer from overflowing when the level gets too high failed.

 

[dbroncos]

how do you put an anti syphon system in place? I am actually hooking up a 200 reefer.

 

[dbroncos]

My red sea return pump appears to be faulty after 2 weeks unless anyone has ideas I haven't thought of yet. And also my sensor that is supposed to prevent the red sea skimmer from overflowing when the level gets too high failed.

Was it the new DC return pump?

 

[flashsmith]

If you have a complete RS setup I'm trying to figure to out how it overflowed?? Was the tank overfilled?

 

[harrylarry]

Did anything actually made by red sea cause your issue?

Lol

 

[clownfishsticks]

If you have a complete RS setup I'm trying to figure to out how it overflowed?? Was the tank overfilled?

The protein skimmer was overflowing, most of which was draining down into the sump, but there is a drain tube that was hanging down outside of the sump that acted as a conduit and water ran down the outside of the tube.

 

[flashsmith]

So... Operator error?

 

[clownfishsticks]

While the tube going outside of the sump was the reason for a mild leak, it was ultimately due to a failing return pump, which was the point of this post. Is anyone else seeing brand new Red Sea return pumps fail?

 

[clownfishsticks]

Was it the new DC return pump?

Yes. Reef run 5000 DC with the controller

 

[clownfishsticks]

So... Operator error?

So, update. Pump was faulty. I would get it reset and it would work beautifully for ... 20 minutes. Took it back to my red sea dealer LFS and they messed around with it for about 30 minutes before we all agreed it was trash. Got a new pump and all is well. Was running without my sump for nearly a month.