Red Sea Reefer 350 G2 catastrophic failure

[ThenoobBread]

Sorry to hear this.
I purchased a reefer 425 G2+ in Nov 2023, the ATO that came with the tank malfunctioned less than a year.

Contacted red sea support, and they insisted on their weird "warranty policy", can't deilver the replacement parts directly to me.
Instead they could only deilver the package to the shop where I purchased my tank, and asked me to contact the shop to arrange a courier for me myself. The shop is located far away from where I live, and I have no idea how to politely ask the shop owner to expect an international package from redsea and send it to me.

NEVER buying any red sea products again.

 

[IKD]

So sorry to see this! When you are back and running I could send you some corals to get you restarted if that would help.

 

[Ioncewaslegend]

People need to vote with their wallets and stop supporting these companies that clearly don’t care about their customers.

The only things I've purchased from Red Sea after my tank failed and they effectively told me to go **** myself have been reagents and coral food. I've followed Randy Holmes-Farley's guides on making alk/ca/mg reagents and I'm transitioning over to Reef Nutrition.

Not only will they never get another dime from me, I'm very active in a large local club in a major metropolitan area. I am VERY outspoken about Red Sea's quality issues, and I have personally cost Red Sea close to a dozen tank sales after I've convinced people to go elsewhere.

 

[Coral Your World]

You gotta be a pretty big goof to buy a Red Sea tank

Sorry to see this! Hope everything gets resolved in your favor. Thanks for sharing

 

[rishma]

This is terrible. I had a smaller RSR for years and all was well, had to sell it during my last move. I know that an incident like this would put me out of the hobby I am sorry you and your family have to deal with it.

 

[carri10]

To the OP. You have my sympathy. I can’t begin to imagine how I would deal with that happening. Good luck with all the aftermath.

 

[LMSquire]

I am looking at my 1.5 year old RSR 350 G2+ right now and this is making me viscerally disturbed. I am SO sorry you’re going through this…oak floors?!? Res Sea is trash. I have been pushed to the brink of insanity with their products, especially the reefmat. Their cs was terrible. The Reefrun and ReefBeat are a joke too. I agree with the class action sentiment for all these reefers who have had their hobby and homes destroyed. I’m a lawyer, maybe I should talk to some friends about this…I’m getting ready to buy a 380 gallon waterbox and now I’m worried about this floating front thing. Ugh. Hope you got all your critters saved guys

 

[Jimbo327]

Way too often with RS tanks. Just terrible. I would not run a large RS tank with the poorly designed wood stand.

If I had a major leak, it would be the end of the hobby for me. But if you are staying in hobby, make sure your next tank has a metal stand, euro-brace, armored seams, no floating front pane, and not RS.

 

[nickng]

And this is the answer. I'm not sure what they are thinking about with their seemingly standard response to a known issue across the hobby. One thing I've learned over the decades is that sometimes, speaking to someone higher up on the food chain can lead to more of a positive outcome, reimbursement wise. Not that I'd go for another tank from them, but perhaps some reasonable trade for product that is not a tank. Hey man, sorry you're going through this.

Take a look at Glass Cages. They are more expensive gallon per gallon, but they've got a great product and excellent support staff. You can actually have them build a tank to your exact specifications. When I finally launch, this is the company I'm going through.

And best thing of all is you can actually schedule a time to speak to the owner Joe@Glasscages to get customization or questions answered about the build.
The other company that comes to mind is Reef Savvy, even though owner(Felix) is super busy, he responded to my email and gave a rough outline quote.
Definitely going with one of these guys when I upgrade to 6 to 8 feet size.
By the way customer service at Innovative Marine has been top notch, always responded and so far honored their waranties

 

[nickng]

The problem is two part.

1) the stand is improperly designed with only one off center load bearing vertical support. This allows the left section. To have a large span that is unsupported leading to bowing. Look where the leak is. In the section that is not supported properly to the left of the support

This allows the bottom panel to bow, which puts increased pressure on the silicone, leading to the seam failure

2) this is a maybe. I read that Red Sea used and low grade silicone that was found to have contributed to the tank failures and they since have switched. I read it here. But is it true? I’m not positive

That stand though is not sufficiently braced. If the floor settled since install it would increase pressure as the stand adapts to the floor

This is the german forum that says redsea may have some issues with their silicon glue (its somewhere in the next 3-5 pages)

Red Sea Beckenwechsel / Qualitätsprobleme - Meerwasserforum

Hier der zugehörige Beitrag :

www.meerwasserforum.info

 

[~MD~Reefs~]

Hey! Do you mind uploading a pic of the Serial Number label? Or Pm me? We’re discussing Gen 2 seam fails in a local club with an LFS owner who has contact with a Red Sea rep. Apparently the Red Sea rep says there is no documented seam fails for G2 tanks, which I feel isn’t true due to all the posts I’ve seen.

 

[Cthulukelele]

So sorry for your loss. Hope all gets sorted with your floors.

I don't remember the last catastrophic tank failure post that WASN'T a Red Sea tank. Being that tremendous an outlier needs some sort of community rallying cry. Yes, they sell the most hobbyist-level tanks. But they absolutely fail both prematurely and at a wildly higher rate.

My 120 gallon aquarium has been in constant use by me and 2 people before me for almost 15 years. No signs of failure other than some nicked superficial silicone. If large tanks need eurobraces, give them eurobraces. Does it make the tank slightly less cool looking? Yes. Does it save the destruction and heartache of a total failure? Absolutely.

 

[Reginald Reefer III]

IMO it's the chemical makeup of the glass they use and the silicone that they use to bond it with. Silicone is supposed to create a chemical/mechanical bond with glass and if the glass is not correct, the silicone will not correctly bond.

 

[VintageReefer]

IMO it's the chemical makeup of the glass they use and the silicone that they use to bond it with. Silicone is supposed to create a chemical/mechanical bond with glass and if the glass is not correct, the silicone will not correctly bond.

The German forums have found issue with the silicone but I can’t understand them

 

[VintageReefer]

So sorry for your loss. Hope all gets sorted with your floors.

I don't remember the last catastrophic tank failure post that WASN'T a Red Sea tank. Being that tremendous an outlier needs some sort of community rallying cry. Yes, they sell the most hobbyist-level tanks. But they absolutely fail both prematurely and at a wildly higher rate.

My 120 gallon aquarium has been in constant use by me and 2 people before me for almost 15 years. No signs of failure other than some nicked superficial silicone. If large tanks need eurobraces, give them eurobraces. Does it make the tank slightly less cool looking? Yes. Does it save the destruction and heartache of a total failure? Absolutely.

Plenty of other companies with medium and larger rimless tanks. Like you, I also can not remember a seam burst thread that was not Red Sea

 

[Cthulukelele]

Plenty of other companies with medium and larger rimless tanks. Like you, I also can not remember a seam burst thread that was not Red Sea

Fair enough. I guess my thought was mostly in the spirit of "red sea please improve the build of your tanks to avoid this by whatever means are necessary"

 

[VintageReefer]

Fair enough. I guess my thought was mostly in the spirit of "red sea please improve the build of your tanks to avoid this by whatever means are necessary"

I agree with you.

The company isn’t going away. They arent going to stop making tanks. Can we at least get them made better? Please?

 

[BryanM]

Well that sucks, and before I bought mine used I did not think about looking for failure threads like this.

I hope I do not have issues with my 425XL G2, the previous owner did not.

 

[VintageReefer]

Well that sucks, and before I bought mine used I did not think about looking for failure threads like this.

I hope I do not have issues with my 425XL G2, the previous owner did not.

From what I’ve seen people have been able to buy time with ratchet straps and some wood blocks. Wouldn’t be a bad thing to keep in/near the tank in case of emergency

 

[Reginald Reefer III]

Well that sucks, and before I bought mine used I did not think about looking for failure threads like this.

I hope I do not have issues with my 425XL G2, the previous owner did not.

Too much time and $$$ to take a chance IMO. I have a Waterbox that shows zero issues with the seams after 3 years.