1 Pump spewing stuff at start up - ideas?

[clka]

Finally got the replacement hood on; also made two trips to the water store this morning and filled the tank with plans to add salt today.

Once we got it started up we noticed that one of the pumps is spewing out tiny white particles (they seem solid) about every 10 secs - at first I thought it might be something from the cod media rack, but that was well rinsed, and both pumps should be spewing if that were the case. The amount is pretty significant, pretty much covers the surface and is sticking to the plastic overflow. Any clue what this could be?

I don't want to add salt until this resolves...for now we have both pumps and the skimmer pump on to try to move water through. I'm guessing the black sponge should catch the particles so I will rinse it shortly. My husband is thinking we might want to dump all the water and start over - ugh, I hope we don't have to do that. I wish I had thought to run the pumps in a bucket before start up.

Also, should the media rack be floating? It has floated up to just below the pumps - all I have on it is the rinsed bag of carbon (that may have dried out a bit since it was rinsed)

Thanks,
Cheryl

 

[Reefmack]

Are you sure it's particles and not microbubbles? Strange only one pump would do it, unless the bottom impeller cover fell off that one when you put the pump in - that little cover falls off easily. Do the bubbles stop when the skimmer is off?

On the floating rack, it may be air trapped in the carbon that is making the bag float, and thus raising the rack with it? Just a guess. I never had a rack in my COD, but it wouldn't be the first time that the carbon bags have floated up. If the bag floated up it might also explain the bubbles from one pump?

 

[clka]

There are a lot of bubbles also, but white particles for sure, some have fallen on the bottom of the tank - they have seemed to diminish over the last hour, so maybe it is resolving itself. I need to take a break from messing with it for a bit....one of the light bulbs came loose and had to fix that, then the GFI tripped as soon as we plugged in the heater separately (150w Rena), so we now have it on a surge protector to another outlet and are calling the electrician. Once I regroup and my frustration level goes down, I think I will try taking that pump out and make sure it is all together, wipe down the inside of the tank and bottom, and rinse the black sponge then start 'er up again and see what happens.

Cheryl

 

[nanoreefing4fun]

Run a square of the white/blue finer filter for a few days & rinse every few hours, pretty normal new tank AND get you water level up ... way up ... to near the top line on the water level window, this should solve microbubbles, though some may be related to the tank breaking in.

 

[clka]

Thanks Glenn, I read through the microbubbles sticky last night and saw your advice there about the water level. We played with pump #2 last night...definitely was some solid stuff that came out of there, we still need to clean those particles off the bottom. That pump is considerably noisier than the other and spews a lot more bubbles. We left only pump #1 running overnight and were happy to see few bubbles this morning. We also wedged the media rack with a plastic straw to keep it at the bottom of the cod. We'll see what happens when we turn #2 back on after cleaning the bottom.

I ordered a spare pump from Marine Depot and that came yesterday (with a bunch of other stuff) so may try switching it out this morning and see if that makes a difference. I will definitely throw in the blue/white filter pad.

I like keeping the water level way up as then I know where I am topping off at though I am a little worried that fish might get over the back partition with the high water level.

I'm feeling better about it all this morning - just got really bummed over all the issues even though they weren't huge problems. Hopefully we'll get to adding salt today and sand and rocks tomorrow.

Thanks,
Cheryl