Help - Power Out.... ?????

[Jan]

Hi Guys

I stay in Boksburg. The substation near my house has burnt out this afternoon so we are going to be without power apparently anything from 5-10 days.

My Dad has already organised a generator, well two so that mine and my brothers tank can stay running, and we can have power for other things too. (bonus of Dad being a sparky...lol)

I have the one genny still running and intend running it through the night if I can, going to fill it up at midnight again and then at 3 if I can get up.

I have luckily arranged to be off work tomorrow to make sure I keep the generator running.

What I want to know is the following:

- What is a safe time for my tank not to be running at all
- If I run just my return and heaters, will that be fine ?

Tank is at 25 degrees. I dunno If I will be able to keep the generator running the whole night but should for most of the night, will it be fine....

 

[Mekaeel]

shit 5 - 10 days???

 

[djmurray]

Ouch buddy thats shit um just really need filtration and heaters depending on the amount of water the tank could last a day or two on a big system or a day on smaller i kept mine for 1 and a half by just adding heat packs and wrapping in blankets good luck hope it gets better

 

[Jan]

Yip, it burnt out that bad. Dad took a video with his phone will try load it if I get chance...

 

[Jan]

Tank total volume is somewhere between 300 to 400 litres

 

[viper357]

Jan, I have had a few power outages and from my personal experience, my tank was fine after about 3-4 hours of no power, so I am sure you will be ok as long as the no power times are not too long. This is just my opinion from my experience but I think if you fill up the gennie at midnight and it goes off at 3am, your tank will be fine for the next 4 hours until 6 or 7am when you can refuel it.

Bear in mind that I do not have any sps (besides monti's).

What I would do is let the gennie run until it cuts out (you say 3 hours), so if you start it at 6am, it will run out at 9am, your tank should be fine until 12 or 1pm when you can shoot home during lunch and refuel it, will then last until you get home after work.

Like I said, my tank was fine after a good few hours, although I do have a much bigger water volume so I don't know if that has anything to do with it.

 

[viper357]

Hopefully one of the pro's will jump in and enlighten us as to how long it takes before the micro-organisms (bacteria etc.) start to die and may possibly pollute the water.

 

[Jan]

Thanks Dean. Makes me feel a bit better now. I'll be home all day tomorrow so will be able to make sure I can run extra pumps. Going to fill genny now and let it run till empty, will see if I can get myself out of bed at about 3 to maybe top it up again....

 

[Alan]

Up to about 6 hrs should be fine depending on bio load, i would try insulate the tank by wrapping blankets etc to keep the heat stable. Try run circulation pumps if you can.

 

[Copperband]

Jan get the genny specs to Dober man, he'll be able to tell you what you can run. Also post the pump and heater specs here.

 

[Kanga]

shit Jan, good luck there.

 

[palmerc]

So how did it go last night Jan? I hear they are going to try restore power to 80% of the affected areas by this afternoon, so I hope your area is in that 80%.

If it gets really bad I am willing to donate you some sump space to you to keep a few fish in, and tank space for some corals if you need it.

 

[Jan]

Hi guys.

All is good this monring. Tank only dropped about 4 degrees. Gennies were off from midnight, got them running at six again this morning. Everything is still alive and seems ok.

Gennies are running full again so all should be fine.


Thanks for the offer Clinton, will let you know.
I hope that we do fall in that 80% they restore power today or tomorrow.

 

[Jan]

The reason we are without power:

 

[Muz]

Good luck Jan

 

[AndreT]

Yup I've read about that fire. Damn. It will probably be a while before power is restored. Good luck.

 

[Mekaeel]

is that a power plant?

 

[Wizard]

Good luck dude, and i thought my 17hours was bad. As has already been said, wrap your tank up in a blanket to keep temp as stable as possible. i ran mys skimmer for an hour every 5 hours and my heaters (600w) for the other 4. but before i clicked that my temp was really low (21) i wasnt running my heaters. i am still battling a few weeks later to get my pb right after he got ws.

 

[Midasblenny]

Yeah like has been said, wrap polystyrene sheets round the tank and use the gennie for return and a heater or two, no worries otherwise like skimmers,lights etc but try keep the room warm with gas heaters. If there is anything i can do, shout,as my tank still has lots of space.

 

[AndreT]

is that a power plant?

According to the news it's a sub station. But it sure looks like a power plant to me.