Best Rookie/newbie goof up....

[Luke_L]

Alright.... just to kick it off.... Photo Contest for the best Rookie/Beginner Screw up! lol
30 days....
Winner gets a huge frag of Birds Of Paradise!
Reply with your submissions

 

[seeks]

DIY your return pump power cable by joing another cable together by striping the ends to make a secure connection; using twist nobs to do it, then put your hands in the tank and then pull the plug by the newly created joint. Yep, I was 24ish and man did I feel that charge, so much my hair fell out, really. Lucky, it didnt reach the tank and I didnt fry! Ok that may not have caused my hair to fall out, but heck, why not.

 

[Luke_L]

DIY your return pump power cable by joing another cable together by striping the ends to make a secure connection; using twist nobs to do it, then put your hands in the tank and then pull the plug by the newly created joint. Yep, I was 24ish and man did I feel that charge, so much my hair fell out, really. Lucky, it didnt reach the tank and I didnt fry! Ok that may not have caused my hair to fall out, but heck, why not.

you need the photo to join the contest.... lmao

 

[seeks]

you need the photo to join the contest.... lmao

 

[Limey]

think you need to recreate the picture for us Shane, check your life insurance is up to date first...

 

[Cliff]

Moving live rock without gloves. This was the beginning of a massive infection. There was talk of cutting my hand off LOL stupid bristle worms

 

[Luke_L]

Obviously I can't win but I do have a submission I thought these things were so cute when I first started in the hobby I eventually had to drain the whole tank bleach it pressure wash the Rock and start over

 

[Will Penfold]

Ok here is my newbie/rookie mistake.

Photo is of my first ever attempt at a saltwater tank back in like 2012. I practically screwed everything up on my first tank and I shut it down after like 5 months.

I did barely any research before jumping in and made a ton of rookie mistakes:

-bought a column tank with all four sides tempered glass.
-bought a used cannister filter. It died like a month in.
-no protein skimmer
-bought used rock and didn't cure it.
-aquascape was firmly up against the glass on three sides
-lastly, the tank was placed in a spot where it got focused sunlight for most of the day.

In like a month the tank just exploded with green hair algae and I shut it down after a couple months.

 

[Cliff]

I had a similar experience. I purchased all my stuff from big Al’s. Thousands of dollars worth of total garbage. All of it needed replaced within six months so that I had equipment that actually kept corals alive. At that time aquarium pros and Reefescape were huge;

Ok here is my newbie/rookie mistake.

Photo is of my first ever attempt at a saltwater tank back in like 2012. I practically screwed everything up on my first tank and I shut it down after like 5 months.

I did barely any research before jumping in and made a ton of rookie mistakes:

-bought a column tank with all four sides tempered glass.
-bought a used cannister filter and used that. It died like a month in.
-no protein skimmer
-bought used rock and didn't cure it.
-aquascape was firmly up against the glass on three sides
-lastly, the tank was placed in a spot where it got focused sunlight for most of the day.

In like a month the tank just exploded with green hair algae and I shut it down after a couple months.



View attachment 270

I think they were the only things that kept me in the hobby. Knowledgeable reefers that actually told me what I needed!

 

[Limey]

So....Not when I was a newbie but after quite a while in the hobby (too much confidence) I plumbed in an extra 90 gallon tank into my 200 gallon system...But! I had no PVC glue so I thought piece of braided hose with a couple hose clamps would suffice to link two 1.5 inch pipes they held for about two months. this was originally a 24 hr fix until i could get a coupler and glue. but thought it was holding and no leaks in 24 hrs so left not a priority any more until one day I woke up at 5am to a screaming barracuda pump and over a 100 gallons on the floor as my pump had just kept pumping, 6 hours to shop vac it all up, rip up 13ft x 25ft carpet and under pad and about three weeks to get rid of the wet dog smell,
the wife was NOT impressed.

 

[Andrew D]

wow, not sure I can compete with some of these. I've made many mistakes but probably the one that bugged me the most was buying a stock 300G DD Marineland tank and realizing that I couldn't get it into the basement! I measured but didn't take into account the need to pivot at the bottom of the stairs, lol. Flavio (can't remember the store name) was great though, sold it for me and I didn't take too much of a loss. The upside though is that I ended up with a custom 350G with coast to coast overflow, built by John at NAFB (big shout out to John and his sons!) right in my basement. Beautiful tank, so happy it turned out this way. No pics but I could probably find an avatar of someone who looks like he's angry and crying at the same time.

 

[Rookie]

Well, I can relate to many of those, however, my biggest mistake was not trimming down the egg crate properly on my 80 hex, left it overhanging the back a little, what could that hurt, right?

Then the wife was cleaning the tank glass and caught her forehead on a shape edge of egg crate. Left a good scar for a LONG time.

She was much angrier at that than when my oldest son dropped a 5 gallon top up bucket of water on our return plumbing shattering the sump and then emptying 50 gallons of water onto the floor.

Fortunately a kind gentlemen from this forum was quick to run over a sump and assist with some emergency plumbing rework!

 

[Luke_L]

Any more entries?

 

[steph]

As a current rookie, I am still in the process of making my first mistakes. I'm sure I will find out about them soon.

 

[Luke_L]

As a current rookie, I am still in the process of making my first mistakes. I'm sure I will find out about them soon.

Perhaps, but it would seem yer doing your homework.

 

[albertmonteiro]

I killed a GSP #fml

 

[Luke_L]

Friday submissions end.... in the meantime... in order to vote for the one you like... you need to like the post... the board software will tally all the likes....

 

[Andrew D]

Luke, do we only like one or can we like as many as we want?

 

[Luke_L]

Luke, do we only like one or can we like as many as we want?

This is new software to me I'm not sure if it will let you, but if you like more than one go for it...

 

[coachV]

My rookie mistake was to not listen to a friend and use a sump that was WAY too small for my 125... and I decided to use a return pump “ inside “ instead of drilling my sump and use a much better, stronger external return pump instead... now I’m constantly upgrading the sump situation. Thank God it was recommended to me to put it downstairs instead of under my reef... I think I would be out of the hobby already lol.