Urgent ,,,help needed please ?

[Lesely]

hi all,
got up this morning and it appears that the right down pipe on our animal bean silent set up is blocked for some reason.,no water at all exiting ?
The emergency overflow had kicked in and is now taking a large amount of water.
It is noisy as hell and I have no idea whats happened.

Can anybody suggest why this has happened and how to clear the down pipe that is now not working.
We don't have easy access to the rear of the tank ?
Help please ?
Thanks

 

[ReeferRob]

You probably have a critter in there or algae. Get some sort of plastic in there and see what's going on. An old plastic coat hanger would work.

 

[salt_for_brains]

+1

 

[Northstar24]

There hS to be something in the line, going to have to try and clear it

 

[fastrd400]

Count your fish, count your snails.

 

[Lesely]

got a plumbers snake, didnt get through the ball valve and u bend...coat hanger not long enough ....hose pipe wouldn't turn around the elbow.....
remember this tank on a 1.3metre stand and is 750cm high itself...against a wall with very little access....bugger

Well we ended up cutting the down pipe near the bottom ball valve and sure enough a very large snail, stuck...couldnt save the snail but after gluing the joiner and setting it all back up good as gold now..
pheww.....was a bit scared i didnt want 1000 liters of water all over my family room, thank god for good plumbing and emergency overflow pipes....cheers to the animal bean silent set up lol

 

[ReeferRob]

Get a strainer of some sort on that pipe to avoid having this happen again. Another good idea is to have a union just upstream from a clog point. I and VERY fond of using unions. That $6-$10 you'll spend now will save you hours of hell later.

 

[Lesely]

Get a strainer of some sort on that pipe to avoid having this happen again. Another good idea is to have a union just upstream from a clog point. I and VERY fond of using unions. That $6-$10 you'll spend now will save you hours of hell later.

What's a union ?

 

[Northstar24]

https://www.google.com/search?q=pvc...OsKNyASLk4DwCg&ved=0CDsQsAQ&biw=2560&bih=1226

They let you easily (and quickly) disconnect plumbing

 

[Aquarian]

This is a union you it works like a coupling but the center is a threaded connection and can be unscrewed for easy removal.