So…I bought another aquarium. The 30-gallon that I have doesn’t have a skimmer and is a little high maintenance. So, I bought a 55-gallon that’s a little more roomy and also has a little more modern configuration.
I’ll share more details as I build this thing out. I got it home and ran into a few problems, mostly leaks.
The owner of the aquarium was super cool and informative. This aquarium was a great deal, but he warned me to replace the seals and hoses, as the aquarium isn’t exactly new anymore. I found a few things like this:
Seals like this will never work, and many of them have this problem. I’ve spent the last week ordering seals and bulkheads to restore this aquarium to its original beauty.
The main bulkhead that the pump is attached to is also undersized:
You can see that the bulkhead has a lot of extra space to slip around. Bulkheads are rated for a size range of openings, so this is properly installed. However, the gasket barely overlapped the hole, making it susceptible to leaks (especially given that I’m a clumsy person who bumps into things.
The brown is sand/sediment that has loaded up on the seal. This makes for a very fragile/leaky connection, so I’m going to replace this bulkhead and seals too. That narrow strip of dark black is the only part of the seal keeping this from leaking. This is not a safe setup because I’m a clumsy ox. I’m one accidental bump away from a leak, and I am way averse to leaks.
More details to come as I work on this, but I’m super excited to have this aquarium in my collection. I’m going to migrate my saltwater setup to this 55 and make it rock solid. Hopefully, I can get some LPS corals going soon.
Thanks for reading!
-John
