at the bulkhead, which is a hole drilled through the bottom glass, inside a ‘caisson-like’ containment called the ‘downflow box’: there is an open hole on the watery side, and a screw-on tap that goes to a hose on the ‘air’ side of the arrangement. Salt water was dripping from the ceiling of the basement, and soaking the craft room carpet in a small area. And a bulkhead with a little leak, as with a dam, can become a big catastrophic leak without too much warning. Why would a bulkhead leak? Either the surrounding glass cracked, or … the gasket that sits atop the bottom washer and under the top washer of the thing, in the water, has got a grain of sand under it. Picture, a downflow box that hasn’t been really cleaned since 2004. Sand. Live things. Grain of sand? Yeah, that could happen.
Now, pulling a bulkhead means draining the downflow box. Jane has pix. But shall we say she had an episode of acid reflux while at the worst of this, and both of us, after working 4 hours on it, re-starting it once sealed at least 6 times, and tinkering to stop a further micro-leak—are so sore we can’t even stand upright. I am at that age I can no longer kneel down and spring lightly to my feet. Well, there was a lot of that requirement in this operation. Jane is sore. I am sore.
And where would you get a bulkhead replacement? Well, at your marine fish store—if it weren’t Monday, when every marine store in the US shuts to regroup. At a plumbing supply? I called the best one in the county and they had no idea what I was talking about. Fortunately I remembered the House of Hose in Spokane Valley, where I got the hose for the tank, and they instantly knew what I was talking about: they deal in tanks and fluids. So I drove after it, and Jane kept cleaning.
Meanwhile—of course—our tank circulation is shut off. And a marine tank starts to go bad 8 hours after a shutdown. Oxygenation. Collection of waste. All stopped.
Fortunately because of the caisson-like arrangement of the box, our corals and fish would only pick up thumps and bangs as we worked and cursed. Shu had to get into it. And we have pix. Jane will put them up when she recovers.
But we are very proud to say we stopped the leak in the ‘up’ line. Now we have to deal with why the ‘down’ line is running more slowly than we’d like—as in—dangerously close to the top of the box, not draining fast enough to empty the box 6″ down—only 2″. So guess what? We now have to search the plumbing of the ‘down’ line for a clog—dating from the time we had an expired calcium test, and didn’t ‘get’ it until we’d overloaded the system with calcium, causing deposit in the pipes. Well, we knew we’d pay for that someday. It may have been what got the ‘up’ bulkhead. But we’re going to have to re-plumb the ‘down’ line next.
At least we have 2″ of leeway left. If that starts shrinking, we are going to have to move faster. But it sure won’t happen before tomorrow. And we are pooped.
That’s sailor-talk for when a wave comes over your stern and you say hello to Davy Jones. Lotta water today.
I’m just glad it wasn’t the bulkhead on your starship. Banging and clanging with O[sub]2[/sub] leaking and the crew complaining the air reserve’s getting stale and the cursing’s not creative enough….. Always a critic, isn’t there? 🙂 Best Wishes. — My Smokey has been trying to help around here, always when I don’t have the camera handy. I want to document it, next time he opens a *drawer.* — Wonder where get papers this son from station offices. Lot laugh, station offices, if I walk up, ask spacer papers for cat. Non-sapient, they say. Lot they know. They say what, you got hani, that not hani, what missing you brain, go ‘way. They not know this cat, a? Lot funny, cat.
Good luck with the down line!
Gack! — I hope you won’t need an Act of Congress to get it sorted. . .
This is pretty much why I do fish tanks the low-tech way (grin). Granted I’m absolutely NOT a gadget gal! Lights, a little water circulation via a sponge filter and heaters (for those that don’t like room temps). But then I like doing water changes and prefer densely planted tanks that do a lot of the water quality maintenance the ‘ecosystem’ way. Today I’m getting a shipment of pretty little Boraras brigittae and a school of Danio erythromicron from a specialty breeder back east. Tomorrow some purple moscow guppies. I’ve got 5g tanks set up for each….cycling with juvenile whitecloud mountain minnows (since I have literally hundreds of fry).
Around here our rule of thumb is that if the water circulation stops for more than an hour….assume all the bacteria will die and you have to deal with those consequences.
Jane has a little old-fashioned (Penguin filter) bichir tank…supposedly there are 2 bichirs in there, but only the Senegal is ever in view, and for what I know, the Ornate has starved himself out of spite…that fish has never come out, and they are not disparate in size. Maybe Ornates only appear when grown.
The bulkhead is holding immaculately. Jane spent the evening painting the cellar stairway, on a ladder on the stairs, and when I hauled her up to dinner, decided dessert had to be painting the fish stand. With the fish on it. We discovered that Ace’s new paint *has* no fumes, which you cannot have around a marine tank.
Well, I tried to help. I fetched, carried, loaded brushes, climbed stairs. I take it in great indignation that I cannot walk those cellar stairs safely without the handrail (it’s removed, for painting)—I take it as a personal insult that I cannot get up from the floor without finding something to lean on. I used to be able to sit down crosslegged and get up from that position without using my hands. Aging is not for sissies, my friends. This aching after you’ve done any little bit of unusual getting up and down is a thorough pain in the ass. And elsewhere.
Welcome to the seasoned citizen set! It’s a bummer, isn’t it?
What Tulrose said. I can still keep up with the youthlings (plus the added bonus of age and guile), but there better be some Advil handy when we’re done. I just had a go’round with newly acquired blood pressure medicine. 12 hours after my first dose, I got stomach cramps I wouldn’t wish on the most annoying of my patrons. After research, stomach pain turned out to be an infrequent but known side effect, but my doctor pooh-poohed the notion I might be in the susceptible 3%. Look, Doc, if I call in and ask for an appointment that day, I am not kidding. If he wants me to have another trial of the same meds, he’ll have to wait until the weekend when I can afford to be laid up for a day.
I’m going to get myself a little set of hand-weights (or find the ones I think I have) and see if I can’t do a little improvement. Or find out it ain’t gonna happen. Don’t want not to have tried.
What is Jane taking for her acid reflux? I’ve found that the Equate antacid tablets, which are equivalent to Gaviscon, work for me. Even though I take a Nexium capsule every night before bed, sometimes, I still get the reflux and it hits at the time when I’ve just fallen asleep and burns not only the inside of my esophagus, but if it gets high enough, I’ve had it go into my bronchial tubes. Now THAT’S scary, because it starts eating away at tissues that are not resistant to hydrochloric acid, and I need them to breathe! Those are the times when I reach the maximum dosage of antacid tablets, and have had several glasses of water to help cool the fires, but it usually takes a couple of hours before I can get back to sleep. I have to prop myself up on the pillows, lie on my back, and not move, and hope I can get to sleep in that position.
Oh, joekc6nlx, I’ve been there so many nights. Exactly as you describe. The thing that helps me the most is to make sure I do not eat anything after 6 pm. Nothing!! If I stay up a couple of hours after I eat, I am usually ok. This works great, but is not always possible with schedules as they are. The Gaviscon or store brand of it works very well. The tablets are kind of foamy when chewed, so be prepared for that, and drink a half glass of water with it.
She’s taking Prilosec. It has its limits of use, timewise, but it helps—just not when she’s twisted into a pretzel in a cube of space that makes a submariner’s bunk look luxurious and something’s sprung a leak of salty fish poo into her hair.
joekc6nlx, try elevating the head of your bed about 6 to 8 inches higher than the foot — which you can do by putting chocks under the headboard legs or a foam wedge between the mattress and box springs, or in my case every throw pillow in the house. Also avoid eating within about 4-5 hours of bed and especially avoid eating caffeine and acidic foods within that time period. Also working it out so that supper is your smallest meal of the day helps too. I’ve got a hiatal hernia you could drive a truck through and reflux is the bane of my existence and one of the primary triggers of my asthma.
Oh, I’ve been to the ENTs, the Gastroenterologists, and they all give the same advice. At one time, I had a waterbed, so elevating the head was not an option. I’m not using the water mattress at the time, so could elevate the head. But it’s heavy, and I don’t have anyone to help lift it. Well, I do have a floor jack in the garage, 😉
Thanks for all of the advice.
They had me on Prilosec first, then went to Prevacid, and after that, Nexium, but then, that’s what’s in the DoD Pharmacies formularies, so that’s what they give me. Since Nexium is still a prescription drug, it’s not something you can get OTC.
Speaking of bad nights of reflux, must have been the power of suggestion, because I had a really bad episode at 5:30 this morning. It’s now 9:00 and I’m still coughing because it got into the bronchial tubes.
[quote]when she’s twisted into a pretzel in a cube of space that makes a submariner’s bunk look luxurious and something’s sprung a leak of salty fish poo into her hair.[/quote]
Oh, the beguiling, glamorous talk of the life of the artiste!
Joe and WOL and Empty Nest, they make wedge pillows that are the easy answer to elevating your head. You can put another, more mash-able pillow atop, or you can pile about five mashable pillows together to achieve the same. It might help. We looked it up, and you can take Tums with those drugs, so that’s one relief: the rule seems to be don’t take another ‘drug’ at the same time, but you can take what amount to topical (surface) preparations, like Tums, probably Alka Seltzer. Likewise keep a bottle of screwtop fizzy water near at night.
@Joe: If you can’t sleep lying on your back, I’ve found that lying on my left side, propped up by pillows as CJ says (1 under the ribs and 2-3 under my head, and 1 behind my back to stop me rolling over) also works. As I’m a bit fat, the doctor said this may change the way the stomach lies in the body a bit, making me more susceptible to acid reflux. For other (slender) people the stomach-entrance may not be positioned in a way that makes this help (I don’t know, I’m no doctor), but it might be worth trying if you’re lying awake a long time because you can’t sleep on your back.
I’ll not repeat all the other tips about reducing the acid by not eating and drinking too close to bedtime, or not eating or drinking certain stuff, but I did find that for me any fizzy drink makes it worse, and old-fashioned ‘chalky’ peppermints have some slight effect if you don’t want to take more Tums or other antacids.
If you look at an anatomical drawing you can see that the bottom end of the stomach is to the left of the esophagus, which is why lying on your left side helps. I take Prilosec and it does the job. All I have to do is miss two doses and wow! — constant heartburn.
Thank you all for the tips and pointers. Since I have “socialized” health insurance, i.e., the U.S. Military Hospital system, I get whatever they have on the formulary. When this was first diagnosed, they put me on Aciphex, then Prilosec, then Prevacid, and now Nexium, as the formulary changes and new medications are added. I cringe every time I hear from my parents about how much they spent on medications for a month, and my costs are the fuel and the time to go to the Air Force Base Medical Center and pick up a refill or get a new prescription from my doctor – who is also at the base hospital. This was one of the things they allow me to have after retirement from the Navy, but it doesn’t compare to the benefits that our Congressional members receive after 6 years in office – free medical and dental care for the rest of their lives. Of course, THEY don’t have to take the mandatory insurance plan that they’ve passed for people who don’t have health insurance. Anyway, politics aside, if my physicians prescribe it and the base pharmacy gives it to me, then I use it. There are exceptions, since the pharmacies do not carry every medication available, so then I have to go outside the system and get it at a local participating pharmacy. Then there’s a co-pay, which is minimal. Otherwise, at the base pharmacy, I do not pay for the medications. If I go to the VA hospital, I am also exempted from paying for my prescriptions due to a 50% disability rating from the VA.
@WOL, yes, I am familiar with my gastro-intestinal anatomy, having seen the insides from both ends (LOL), while lying on my left side and having a TV monitor in front of me. I have considered asking for the surgery to correct the hiatal hernia that I have at the base of my esophagus, but when it was first diagnosed, it wasn’t that big a problem, so the G-E didn’t correct it when he did the endoscopy. (He was trying to find out why I’m anemic, not why I have GERD, so probably wasn’t prepared for that procedure.)
If I’d use the CPAP as I’m supposed to do, I wouldn’t have most of these problems, but the mask cuts into my upper lip, and none of the other masks I’ve tried work for me. (insert plaintive whine and moldy cheese here)
I’m glad Jane gets relief from the Prilosec, as well as others here. It’s just not cost-effective for me, when the Nexium does its job. BTW, shameful admission here: I did have pizza for supper Tuesday evening, along with a bottle of beer, so yes, when you consider how late I had supper and then what I ate and drank, and then how soon afterward I turned out the lights, yep, this was self-inflicted
Note for Joe re CPAP: If you sleep with your mouth closed, might a Sleepweaver mask work for you? They don’t fit all faces, but since they are all cloth they are very comfortable for those who can use them. I switch from my FX to the Sleepweaver when my face is tired of the pressure from the nasal pillows.
Whuff! I took a look at the Sleepweaver mask. It might work, but it’s ‘spensive!!!! I don’t know if I could get it through the VA, but I know it wouldn’t be available through my regular insurance. No durable medical equipment is allowable under my TRICARE Prime for Retired Members. (betcha my Senators and Congressman don’t have that restriction)
I’ll have to ask the VA Hospital, since they’re the ones who gave me my current CPAP.
Joe, I really didn’t like the mask option from the get-go and found nose pillows to be much more satisfactory. The only problems I’ve had with them were either dryness/irritation in the nasal passages due to dry air or unbalanced flow, or using a pillow set many months past its useful life. I haven’t noticed any permanent indentations or such from using them when they are properly adjusted, but I did learn immediately that the chinstrap goes on underneath the mask harness if you don’t want the harness and mask to feel as if they’ve been permanently imbedded into your skull.
Joe–I’m retired with Medicare and supplemental insurance, so I get a new mask every 6 months. I got a second FX last time, and have 2 Sleepweavers. Planning on getting a third Sleepweaver in January (unless someone comes up with a fantastic new mask). The Sleepweavers can be put in the washing machine, they say, though I’ve never done that. If you can’t get one and would be willing to consider a used model, I could toss one in the washing machine and, if it emerges intact, mail it to you. At cpap.com the Sleepweaver is $99 and the Swift FX, probably more like what Brennan has, is $127. (There are reviews at cpap.com if you want to read about them and see what pros and cons others have found. Neither one covers your mouth, so if you are a dedicated mouth breather they wouldn’t be good choices.)
My CPAP has a small heating unit in it to warm the water in the reservoir. I can adjust the temperature of the water to suit the moisture needs, as well as adjust the pressure. According to the manufacturer, the patient is NOT supposed to have that little key card, heh heh….but the VA gave it to me, anyway.
I’ll give it a shot and ask the VA if they do have the Sleepweaver or the SwiftFX. I’m not a mouth breather, so one of the two might be good for me.