DIY that went wrong thread

[raskal311]

Well I thought it would be a good idea to post a DIY that went bad thread seeing that people really only post DIY project that turned out well. I think that reading about project that didn’t turn out right would be as useful as reading about project that did turn out well. I can’t remember one that really went bad for me at this point but I am going to start a project in a few days that will involve me drilling glass and building sump and such for the first time. I'd like to learn from other peoples mistake before i start hacking at my tank. So please post your horror stories for everyone else to learn from.

[evolution]

Well, I was making a Kalk reactor similar to the PM one but could tolerate pressure. I stood it up to route the bottom edge flush with the bottom, the phone rings, as I turn around my hand just barely brushes the reactor and it falls over, cracking in half.


Still havent made another one yet

[speakeraddict]

I used to build custom glass tanks for really weird installs (wedge shaped for under a staircase for example - don't ask why they wanted it that way)

My buddy was helping meet a deadline and scored and popped a piece of glass and didn't slide it back on the table. I turned around and went to reach into a drawer and shaved off a piece of the back of my hand as big as a nickel all the way to the bone. It was bleeding so profusely you would have thought I cut my hand off. I was working for myself (read no insurance) so I carterized (sp?) it to stop the bleeding in my kitchen with a hot soldering iron. I have the scar to prove it.

That was the worst one.

speakeraddict

[BarryF]

Originally posted by speakeraddict
so I carterized (sp?) it to stop the bleeding in my kitchen with a hot soldering iron.

You win.

[speakeraddict]

I really don't think there is a prize that could make up for it and in retrospect consider myself very foolish for having done so. But, being 24, broke and without insurance, you'll try just about anything. I can tell you that it was excrutiating.

Now, over a decade later, I wouldn't have the guts to do it again.

speakeraddict

[raskal311]

hoolly cow... now thats what i was looking for. Now i now to watchout for that kind of stuff.

[GROSSR]

speakeraddict : Yes you win. In fact, most of my friends in the trades have storys of drill bits into the meat of their arms, or being elecuted or burned with a torch. You have it all, cut, bleeding, and you burned yourself. I got a paper cut.

Maybe I can get second place. build a DIY denitrator. Could not get it to work for the life of me. Either I coiled it too tight or whatever, but, once seal and it wouldn't flow water, I pitched it.
Then their was the case of the DIY sump that leaked and leaked and leaked. I could never get this thing to stop leaking. I just broke it apart and tried with new acrylic. The second one never leaked. I am using it as my refuge.

rich

[Vincerama2]

I think the first DIY thing that you should get ... is health insurance!

OK, non-injury screw up; I decided that I would drill my 40 gallon breeder tank, but being in a one bedroom apartment, I really didn't have a place to do it ... except the bathtub! Here I could run water over the hole to cool it as I dremeled a hole into it. I placed some wood in the tub to support the tank on its side (since bathtub bottoms are curved) and I removed the shower doors. As I was lowering the tank into the tub (BY MYSELF) I bumped the tank on the shower door rails .... and of course, the tank cracked on both sides. Luckily, it didn't shatter and cut my feet off! I sold the tank for $10 to a guy that had Bearded Dragons or some other reptile

The Moral of the Story (not disaster should be without a lesson, right?) is;
1) You should not shlep tanks around by yourself, or anything heavy (I hurt my back removing a patio door by myself too).
2) A proper PLACE and environment to do the work is just as important as having the tools to do it. For instance ... the bathtub was not a good idea...now I live in a house with a workshop and a nice workbench...that would be 100 times better place to do this. Even a sturdy picnic table outside where I can run a hose over the tank would be better!


V

[speakeraddict]

One more that doesn't involve injury:

I helped a buddy of mine design a tank to hold his prized chainlink moray "pops". We came up with using a 60 gallon cube and center drilled to bottom for an overflow so you could walk all around the tank.

I told my buddy "don't cheap out and buy 1/4 inch glass and try to get by with reinforcing the top". He took this as "buy 1/4 inch for the bottom not sides" (he has a very peculiar way of interpretting the english language) Anyway, he had the piece drilled for a very large bulkhead fitting and then glued up the 3/8" sides to it - all is well...for the moment.

His wife woke up to the sound of water splashing three weeks later and stepped on pops in the dark and almost clawed my buddy's back off trying to escape.

When they called me at 2:00 in the morning to come help, all I could do was lay the phone down and lay on the floor laughing at the thought of the carnival that must have taken place!

speakeraddict

[Vincerama2]

Another, not disastrous, but annoying.

I made my own HOB overflow thing, using two Lee "convalescent home" or "Specimen boxes" based on a plan I found on the net...
(http://www.reefs.org/library/diy/diy_winner1.html if you are interested)

But I couldn't figure out how to cut the teeth. I figured that my dremel would do it...so I put in the "spiral cut" bit and started dremelling. It was a disaster. First I used a drill to cut starter holes, the plan being that I would cut the holes, then dremel up to the edge of the box, leaving a nice U shaped overflow tooth gap. Well, I used a regular drill bit (and the specimen boxes are THIN acrylic) and just about every hole had cracked edges. The LAST hole I drilled cracked the length of the box GRR! OK, no problem, some epoxy will fill that up (yeah...) So then I start dremelling and the acrylic just melts all over the bit, then the centripetal/fugal force of the dremel started flinging hot acrylic spikes at me! I refused to stop now, I was so angry (anger fueled DIY .. not good) and all the teeth were scraggly and cracked. I'd switch to another spiral bit as the one I was using got gummed up. Well guess what happens when the acrylic solidifies again. Yep, I had 3 plastic encased bits that took 45 minutes to clean off.. mostly consisting of smashing the bit with a hammer.

Guess what, I then went to the hardware store and bought the dremel 1/4" 'router bit" and it cuts through acrylic like butter! It cost $12 or so, but it doesn't melt the acrylic, it doesn't crack the acrylic, it leaves a clean cut and it doesn't melt the acrylic onto itself.

Moral: If a tool is not working for the job at hand. Stop and get the right tool. ie' the right tool for the right job ... everyone says it...it's true.

V

[Vincerama2]

Another annoying one;

Having bought a new (used) router, I was anxious to try it, so I put my acrylic tank, which I was going to use as a sump, on my kitchen floor (one bedroom apartment) and started routing away. I was amazed by how great it was! I routed most of the perimeter "euro-bracing" off the tank (I was adding baffles, which would brace the tank) OK, I didn't use a guide so the cut was waggly...but you can not imagine how IMPOSSIBLE it is to clean up acrylic chips from a kitchen. The bits are statically charged or something and stick to EVERYTHING, especially my broom! I moved from that apartment a year later and I found acylic flakes stuck to the side of the refrigerator. And the other day I found flakes stuck to some pots and pans I don't use much...this is over a year later and in a totally different house!

My fiancee screamed her head off right after I did this when she came over, opened a cupboard and found it "infested" with these "white bugs or worms" (acrylic flakes!) that was worth a laught anyway

Moral: Same as above, don't route acrylic in your kitchen! And if you do, at least try to direct the chips to ONE area, rather than routing out in a circle and ensuring a 360 degree chip dispersal!

V

[tampa-reefer]

I mess up all the time and still do, i get ahead of myself when working with acrylic. Aka: building beckett skimmers and forgeting to add the baffles before its sealed up.....

[NwG]

Well mine is pretty good....
Thought I need more juice, So I flipped off the breaker and started to run new wires under a crawl space under my house... I need both hands to move around so I tied the wires to my belt loop on my pants.. Now, of course I am a fool so I had already wired the stuff to the box.. but I figured "the breaker is off what can happen"

Well my girlfriend came home and noticed the tank was not running... I had showed her how to flip the breaker if that ever happend.... You can guess the rest of the story most likely...
she went downstairs, didn't see me (I was 20' into the crawl space) and flipped the breaker!!!!!
Now anyone who has had a good shock know what that is like..
Try 110v TIED TO YOUR ARSE!!!! IN A CONFINED SPACE!!!!
I nearly knocked myself out banging hy head into the rafters...
She is no Longer allowed to touch the breaker box.....

[acropora1981]

"being 24, broke and without insurance, you'll try just about anything. I can tell you that it was excrutiating"

sometimes im so glad im Canadian.

[spe934]

NwG -

I almost fell out of my chair reading that! Funny stuff man... Hope you are ok though.. Why does that sound like something out of a movie?..

[NRA4EVR]

Ok, ill bite.

Now this is in a one month period

Week #1.
I was installi ng that masonite board over the drywall in my sump room in the basement. Its the stuff that looks like a tiled wall but comes in 4x8 sheets and is very hard. Well, the easiest way i found to hang it was to use liquid nails and put a few screws into the top.well i was driving the screw with my cordless and the screw popped out from underneath. The phillips bit broke through my thumbnail and exited the other side of my thumb. I made it upstairs, and the wall caught me as ipassed out. I have great insurance, but never made it to the doctor because i am a jackass. I only have partial feeling in my thumb.

Week #3
Carrying the shelving downstais for my rubber maid feeding bin i was walking down the stairs and stepped on a piece of 1.5" pvc. For some reason i jolted and all of my weight and the weight of the shelf transferred to my foot that was partially on the pvc. Needless to say, i heard a snap and broke the long bone behind my pinky toe.

[easttn]

NwG,

Thanks, I just sprayed my flat panel with cheesy poofs. That was great, glad your ok.

[EdMiller]

I was given an old 30 gallon tank for free because it was leaking. I was going to use it for a sump on my reef tank, but it was a bit too long to fit under the stand. I figured, no problem, I need to take it apart to reseal it anyway, I can just cut it down a bit. Well, by the time I got done with it, I was able to salvage just enough glass to make a nice little 10 gallon QT tank. I believe several bandages were also needed to stem the flow since I can't work with glass and not cut myself. I hate working with glass.

I ended up building an acrylic sump. At least I can cut acrylic with my table saw.

[H20ENG]

Holy crap this is great stuff!!!

Thankfully, I've never gotten hurt or botched any project beyond repair ( Ok, except for the first Uni seal project).
But routing in your kitchen???
One time, on night shift at a public aquarium, I had to rout the top openings larger in a new "quadrant" tank. Damn Tru-view only made it with 6 x 12 openings. So I drew it all out, and free hand routed it (VERY friggin carefully!) with the big Bosch. I was covered head to toe with white snow. I cleaned that up and thought I was all good. I came back around at 0400 for a water change and saw it- About 12' up the dark blue painted wall was a damn acrylic shaving SCULPTURE. I fought that mess with a shop vac for almost an hour, meanwhile almost flooding a tank, getting shocked by all the static, getting scared $@#$less by a wandering security guard, and STILL was chewed out for the "mess" left in the morning.
That was the funnest job I ever had. Plenty of good stories from that place: electrocutions, BIG floods, fire alarms with 30 second- push-the-deadman-button-or-the-sprinklers-WILL-go-off drag races, fishing a womans prized broach out of the touchpool drain line, siphoning touchpool water into my mouth (100g closed system on a busy day), chasing escaped giant pacific octopus across the floor, 12,000 volt ozone generators, relamping hot 400watt metal halides from a ladder strapped to a tiny raft, and many more...
Whos next?

[Aquayne_wv]

Once I decided that I wanted the look of a sand bottom in a cichlid tank but be able to clean it like a bare bottom. I got about 5-10 lbs of pool filter sand and mixed it with a tube of aquarium safe silicone. Mixed it in a cheap plastic bowl then put it in the empty aquarium. It was a home built plywood tank 24 inches square ( a picture of it was in FAMA about 8 years ago). I worked in a well ventilated room, BUT the 24" depth meant that I worked upside down with my head down inside the tank......
I knew there was a problem when I started puking. No major problems just a little liver damage.

Wayne
Aquayne

[Karl K]

tag

[Shouse94]

I was working for myself (read no insurance) so I carterized (sp?) it to stop the bleeding in my kitchen with a hot soldering iron. I have the scar to prove it.

GODDA...!

[CaptainCoral]

No major problems just a little liver damage.

Yike's! Some of us don't need any more help in this area.

I just finnished gluing up my skimmer project and found that the cups drain hole(with a fits one way only flange) is in the way of the height adjusting hartford loop. Doh. So now I have the loop glued in at a slight angle to miss the drain line.

[Simms142]

Me......

[dafraguy]

i don't feel so bad now i was making my first diy skimmer i bought acrylic tube and sheet cut everything to size built the base and routered a six inch circle and test fit the tube it fit perfect real tight i continued to assemble the skimmer let it cure overnight the next day i put it on my kitchen table and began to fill it with freshwater to test it for leaks i am estimating about 5 to 7 gallons of water that is when i discovered that i didn't weld the tube to the box when the tube just popped out and sent alot of water on the table and floor