rusting check valve?

If you are going to use a check valve in you aquarium set-up, use a "swing" check valve not a "spring" check valve.The spring has metal(a spring..lol) in it, a swing is just plastic and rubber.

 

I completely disagree with oceanparadise and am currently using a coppered tank and over 30lbs of coppered live rock and 25lbs of coppered sand in my display. Pick up some cuprisorb(comes in a little pouch). it will remove copper trace elements. I would also run a poly-filter(this is a copper test and removal pad at the same time. The pad will turn blue if copper is present). Your tank will be fine. The whole copper thing is getting out of hand and a lot of people talk through hear say. I have first hand expirience with coppered tanks, equipment, rocks and sand and have never had an issue yet. Just be proactive and get some curprisorb and poly-filters and you should be set. If there were trace elements in the parts per billion, you may not have any die-off right away. Copper death is not immediate or instant. Watch your snails, they are a little more sensitive than the hermits. Good luck.

Try to avoid any hardware that uses metal components and avoid placing anything metal in your tank.

 

Why do you have a check valve? Check vales are a flood waiting to happen, not if but when, its inevitable and will happen.

A properly designed system needs no check valves or drilled holes, you rely on an air gap on your returns and sufficient room in your sump, if you don't have that you have problems.

A reef tank is very similar to a wastewater treatment plant and we avoid check valves like the plague in WWTPs. All it takes is a single grain of sand or flake of food to defeat a check valve. Remember it does not have to be a catastrophic failiure, even a trickle will eventually flood in a power outage.

I would evaluate your design and eliminat the check valve ASAP, brass or waterworks bronze which is usually what they are is made up of a copper alloy and copper is not good long term. I disagree on the Cuprisorb and other treatments, copper can not always be removed, especially in porous live rock and substrate. It can be theer forever once it is introduced and that is proven time an again in the drinking water industry.

 

well, I've been running coppered rock and substrate, filters, mag floats, even another coppered tank. All was treated with copper ich meds for months daily. Then several water changes and a pack of cuprisorb and it was untraceable. I have not had ANY copper register on test kits and 0 blue on my poly-filter. I do not have snails, inverts or coral dying and all is well. I even have the copper treated tank running as a small basic reef. I've got snails, hermits, several soft corals with not one single issue for over 4 months. I am a true believer, that with time and effort, copper can be removed from rock, substrate, tanks, ect with water changes and the use of copper removal items such as cuprisorb and poly-filters. There is no need to give your tank an acid bath or bleach and rinse 10 times. All that IME has been proven to be bunk.

 

You are definitely the exception and not the rule. There are those who have been doing this much longer than you and I and your results are not normal. In my 30+ years in saltwater tanks I have not had much exposure to copper since I work with it in a wastewater plant application and know what it is capable of. Its a vey restricted chemical in the water/wastewater industry because of its destructiveness and its effect on streams, rivers and impoundments.

 

Should run a poly filter just to be on the safe side. Turns blue with copper.

 

I would to be safe.

 

Cuprisorb will remove copper from the system. It does take an extremely long time though. As stated above, you should be safe.

Marine depot has plastic ones if you can not find locally.

 

I agree on the bad things that copper can do. Alot of this forum stuff is "I heard this..." and hearsay becomes factual somewhere down the line and everyone starts sounding like robots repeating the same stuff with no first hand experience to back it up. I don't think I am the exception to the rule, i just think that too many people are receiving advice saying that it is not possible to remove the copper, "once coppered, you might as well throw it out because ANYTHING that was coppered cannot be used in a reef tank", blah blah blah, ect. So I decided to prove that it is possible to re-use coppered rock/sand and equipment by doing my own tests. It takes awile and its not going to come out overnight, but it is definitely possible. I am just telling my experience on how to remove copper and re-use equipment, and I have not had any issues. There is a well respected member on this site that has 100+ lbs of rock that has been treated with copper and now its all in a 100gallon+ tank and its a full blown sps reef, again with no problems. So given my first hand experience and the experience of a few others, it IS possible to remove copper.

 

Crush or break up a few pieces of porous live rock. I am confident you will still find traces of copper in them. Anaerobic bacteria live in those spaces and would probably perform better if the copper were not present. It may be possible to remove some but I doubt all traces of copper. It would take a lab to prove this and neither of us have one of those available to us full time.;D Sure wish I did, I could have some fun if someone else was footing the bills......