Please help. brass valve releases copper in reef.

My corals have shrink over the past few days, and 10 - 15 snails have died.

This morning I did research brass valve for reef tank, and everywhere I read so far said brass is a BIG NO NO. Anyway, I quickly remove the brass valve and replaced it with a plastic ones.

Does this mean game over for me? The brass valve have been installed for about 3 weeks, all the fishes are fine, and so are all the crabs. Snails and corals on the other hand took the biggest hit.

I bought 250mL of Cuprisorb hoping it would remove the copper and I will do 10% WC later on today. Should I get the poly filter as well? How much copper do you guys think could leach into the tank?

 

Only way to know for sure how much got into the tank is with a copper test kit. They should only be around $10 at a LFS.

~Will.

 

Sounds like you are doing all you can do. Cuprisorb is good. Carbon will also help. I would do a larger water change, probably at least around 30%.

 

I agree with the previous info. The fish should be fine as they have a higher tolerance of copper than inverts. The corals may not make nor the snails/crabs/clams or any other invert you have in there. You shouldn't add any metal to the system, even stainless steel, eventually it will corrode. At least you know now.

 

oh dang thats no good i would do anything to fix it.i dont know much about metals rusting into your tank besides the fact its no good at all. The owner at my lfs said one of his clients spent $10000 on live stock and he lost everything because he was cheap and got a brass valve and the guy had to pay him another $10000 to restock plus a visit to fix his plumbing.

 

I took some sample of the water before adding the Cuprisorb, I will wait for 24 hrs and take another sample. Hopefully if there is any copper in there I can tell if Cuprisorb did the job.

30% WC, is that too much for them? I did add a new bag of carbon as well. I was told by others that the test kit won't help because the copper precipitate. Will poly filter help as well?

You mean eventually my clams. snails, crabs and corals will die?

Lesson learned the hard way. Usually I’m very careful, but this time I rush into doing something what could be avoided. Sucks to be me.

I was hoping that someone on this forum had the same problem and have corrected the issue using the same method as I did.