# Discus tank sprung a leak !!!  Help



## candymancan (17 Mar 2015)

luckily it happened when I was in my room..  I was at my desk on my computer and I felt water on my leg and looked over at my discus t ank and it was shooting water all over my desk...  The leak wasn't large probably would have taken hours to drain...  But its lower on the tank...

I don't want to have to remove my discus and place them in my 55g and possibly spread disease...  The tank is a 44g pentagon I bought it on craigslist and its about 10 years old made by perfecto..  The silicon on it actually looks in good shape, compared to my other two perfecto tanks which are around 15 and 23 years old.. both which have never sprung leaks...

But the previous owner did mention this tank was sitting dry for many years...  Soooo like I marked where the leak was coming from drained the tank, rushed to petco and got 3 tubes of aquarium safe silicon..  I lowered my heater in the bottom of the tank and put in an air stone...  But the tank has only like 6 inches of water in it.. the leak was pretty low in the tank..

I use a box cutter and cut off an inch of the silicon, cleaned it up with antiseptic wipes and im waiting for it to dry..  Im going to try patching this spot and see if this works...  Will this work ?? Or do I honestly have to tear down the entire tank, and remove all the seals and start over ??


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## tam (17 Mar 2015)

Yikes, I don't know the answer to fixing it, but if you do need to drain it or it gets worse, rather than moving all the fish to the other tank try a water butt or similar - it won't look pretty but it will hold water, and you can run the filter/heater etc. to keep everything ticking over. We've a 50g butt - I think it was designed as loft water tank, that's used to quarantine pond fish, but has been put to use to hold the contents of fishtanks before. The other place to try is fish shops or pond/tank building companies they might have temporary holding tanks (like pop up fish tanks) you can rent.


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## Martin in Holland (17 Mar 2015)

.......


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## roadmaster (17 Mar 2015)

I would do as suggested with regards to temporary holding tank for the fishes, and I would tear down the tank and re-seal all glass if I were going to attempt to use the tank.
The small leak could have been a sign of things to come that may be much worse next time.


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## foxfish (17 Mar 2015)

That is an amazing picture! Scary stuff eh...
You should be able a tell  the overall conditsion of the silicone by just pushing at the edges to see if it is still well stuck but let's be honest, it would be difficult to rest with after seeing a leak like that!
I am not sure about resealing the whole tank either as that is quite a job, it might be better to get a different tank.
I guess it depends on your disposition as to wether you could live with a repair or not.


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## roadmaster (17 Mar 2015)

Masking tape,razor blades,100% silicone,and some alcohol (rubbing) and remove old silicone  one glass at a time and repair same.
Maybe took me two hours to re-seal 300 litre and 24 hours to cure.
Tank has held for going on ten year's now.
Couldn't afford a new tank of same size.


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## Tim Harrison (17 Mar 2015)

OMG...odd shaped tank and complicated joints...I'd buy a new tank. The only thing I can think of in the meantime is trying to plug it somehow from the inside, maybe with Evo-Stick Putty http://www.diy.com/departments/evo-stik-putty/191081_BQ.prd which sets under water, or some such, or maybe placing a piece of plastic bag against it and let the water pressure hold it in place.


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## candymancan (17 Mar 2015)

I fixed it.. In my haste as it was 1 hour before closing time for the pet store..  I bought a silicon tube for aquarium but didn't realize it was black !!.... But whatever I used it anyway, drain the tank down another 2 inches.. my discus had only like 4-5 inches of water, I put my heater in the water, an air stone, and power head and then I marked where the leak was and I used a razor blade and cut only an inch of the old calking out and cleaned it up and used the black silicon to fill the hole I created..  Let it sit overnight and the next day (today) I decided to get new rocks for my tank..  As I hated those tan pebbles...

Defo not buying a new tank, don't have the money..

Removed my discus in a 2 gallon bucket along with all my other fish, put an airstone in there and my giant wisteria on top to give them cover..  and removed all my gravel and put in Caribsea floramax substrate the redish one..  filled the tank up.. let the dust settle, vacuumed it up and filled it back up again.. turned on my canister filter and pumps and slowely put my discus back in..

My main worry in this is the 2217 eheim canister filter was off for about 18 hours..  As the water level was too low for it to run..  I worry all my BB died, but we will see.  So far all my fish are doing fine and my patch is holding..  Oh and as for testing the old silicon on tanks, yea all the silicon on this tank feels fine.. Like literally if I put my fingers on the egde inside and move my finger it stays on the glass..  Nothing is weak..  This leak literally came out of the middle of the seam..  not the sides..  Sadly with this black silicon its pretty damn ugly.. but it worked..

Im going to order the proper silicon on amazon and drain the tank and cut the black stuff out and put the clear stuff in to make it match..  And no I didn't redo the entire tank because I didn't want my discus in a bucket for 24 hours..

Here is a picture of how it looked before, and then after the rock change I really like these redish/black floramax rocks.  I know the black seem is ugly.. but its all the store had last night and they were closing in an hour..


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## roadmaster (18 Mar 2015)

Sticks out like a turd in the punch Bowl.
I would start saving for another tank.


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## Tim Harrison (18 Mar 2015)

Glad you got it sorted...I'm sure it'll be all be fine.


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## candymancan (18 Mar 2015)

roadmaster said:


> Sticks out like a turd in the punch Bowl.
> I would start saving for another tank.




Im the fixer upper type.. I work on my Jeep myself, do my own home improvements..  I never pay anyone for anything because I can do it all myself, including major engine repair which ive done...

The black silicon is all the store had man.. I know it looks ugly, but its a temp fix..  why would I toss a perfectly good tank when I spend $10 on a tube of clear silicon on amazon.com and fix it so it doesn't look bad lol ? makes no sense


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## Rahms (19 Mar 2015)

candymancan said:


> The black silicon is all the store had man.. I know it looks ugly, but its a temp fix..  why would I toss a perfectly good tank when I spend $10 on a tube of clear silicon on amazon.com and fix it so it doesn't look bad lol ? makes no sense



Well now we have arrived in the endless debate of time vs money vs enjoyment  there are limited hours in each persons life and so almost every human on the planet will have to purchase someone elses services to make up the deficit between "things I want to do" and "things I have time to do." Time is the real investment. Additionally, many people really wouldn't want to silicone an entire hexagonal tank all by themselves, regardless of spare time.

It's good that you work on your Jeep though.  Even if you hated it and were short on time, work on those things is a bloody ripoff!


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## ian_m (19 Mar 2015)

candymancan said:


> My main worry in this is the 2217 eheim canister filter was off for about 18 hours


Don't worry we had a power cut that tripped the RCD's in our house (and all the neighbours), neutral fault at substation, when we were away one Xmas. Came back and found that power had been off for 3 days (according to our house alarm). House was f'ing cold, fish tank was about 18C. Turned all back on, tank warmed up, filter filtered nothing interesting fish tank wise at all.

Your silicone failure was probably due to poor bonding at that section, usually a finger print not cleaned off before siliconing. To repair, cut as much away as possible, float cling film and kitchen towel on remaining water to catch the bits. Maybe even use a chemical silicone eater/remover to remove the final film left on the glass, not too sure if fish friendly but I have used before and not suffered fish issues, just catch the bits. Clean with meths or IPA and reapply silicone. Leave 24hours job done.

I know you are US based, but I used this.
http://www.screwfix.com/p/no-nonsense-sealant-remover-100ml/88987

And use these to profile your silicone. Fantastic tools these.
http://www.screwfix.com/p/no-nonsen...ts/45287#product_additional_details_container

Other cause of silicone failure is placing tank and a non flat base. This cause twisting of the side panes and silicone tearing/separation, usually at the tops of joints. Doesn't look like this in your case.

Anyway job done, money saved. Ok apart from black silicone, why not use it to glue rocks together with it to make nice rock piles & caves etc etc.


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## sciencefiction (20 Mar 2015)

Glad you have it sorted. I had the same problem a couple of years back, but worse as half of the top seal on one corner sprung a leak. I bought non-toxic silicone that dries under water immediately It was some sort of pond and pool new generation silicone non-toxic to fish. and then I stuck a piece of glass on the outside over the leak, covering that side of the seal too completely as much as possible.  So far, fingers crossed, two years, the tank is fine. I didn't even move the fish out. But just fixing the leak with only silicone, without attaching new glass over it, sprung a new leak in a couple of weeks.


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## candymancan (29 Mar 2015)

.
Yea my patch Job didn't hold..  It sprung a leak again cept this time I lost 10 gallons of water before I found it..  Carpet was soaked and went through the ceiling...  Gave me a reason to repaint the ceiling lol but anyway, carpets dry ceiling is fine now I repuddied it and used kilz and painted the whole ceiling it needed it anyway.

But the tank, I tore it down completetly cleaned it up.. put my fish in my 55g tank and my smaller fish in my 10g to catch em easier.   I used a razor blade and took ALL the old silicone off on the inside, and the outside of the 2 front panels since its / \ shaped and has a big gap.   I use rubbing alcohol wiped it down and scraped each panel like 20 times to remove every spec of fine silicone off.

I taped it up and bought some Aqueon 10z aquarium clear silicone and redid the entire tank.. wopre gloves and used my finger to spread it out evenly and nicely.. and took the tape off and I let it dry for 40 hours.  I filled it up on the deck for 9 hours and decided to drain it and bring it in since temps that night were going to be like 27f.  I set it up back in my room and put the substrate and all my plants back in and filled it up..  Marked the water level with a sharpie..  Next day I put my discus and fish back in..  And its been 7 days now and no leaks at all..  I didn't lose a fish, not even a neon or cardinal or shrimp.

However I think I may have a problem..  I put my hand in the water yesterday to feel the silicone inside to see how its doing and it feels fine.. but when I rubbed the edges slightly it started to peal away from the glass..   when it did that I just stopped and used a razor blade to cut that off, but it seems to be doing this on all the edges of the new silicon I put on when I rub them..  Granted I know silicon in the tank doesn't get rubbed like that but still..  This kinda scares me..  I thought maybe its because it was too thin.. but even the thick layers I didn't clean up very well were peeling off if I rubbed them enough.  The outside of the tank though (those 2 front panels / \ that I had to reseal as well..  Don't do this.. so this leads me to believe its because of the water in the tank that's somehow deteriotating the silicone maybe ?? I dunno..

Here is a picture of the section well one section im talking about..  I didn't rub it hard just with some pressure to see how the seal pealed off.. and this is what I ended up with..  Im not worried about the missing silicone in that spot which I had to cut since it wasn't on the glass anymore..  Not worried about it because I made a wider seem then factory and its sealed on the outside on that part as well..  But still this doesn't seem normal to me..

Or is this normal because of the water and I just need to stop rubbing it ?   I let it dry for 40 hours... bottle said 24-48 hours and so does every source online..  So it isn't like I let it dry for 8 hours... Has anyone who has resealed an aquarium before had this happen ? I know I cleaned it good.. I scraped every panel like 20-30 times and got every spec of old silicon off.. I spent 4 hours scraping it.. I went overboard probly lol but I wanted to be sure I did it correctly.

First two pics are when I was water testing it and first set it up.. the 3rd pic is where im talking about the outside edges come off the glass when I push my finger on them.  See the U shape part missing that I had to cut out after it came off the glas


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