[APD] Re: Taking Things Apart -- Carbo Plus

["Ann Viverette" <annv777 at houston_rr.com>]

OK, I took it apart, or rather I got my husband to take it apart for one of
the screws was sort of glued (tamper proof I guess) and when we looked
inside, the green wire didn't connect to anything and appeared to never have
been connected to anything. The white and black wires were securely
connected, but the green was neatly trimmed and although there was a third
screw just below where the other wires were connected, it looked as if the
green wire never was connected, no bits of wire at the screw, no appearance
that the screw had ever been used. The other wires extended into the unit a
about an inch to connect, but not the green. Just neatly trimmed to stop
just inside the box.

So, I just glued the cord back a bit better so it wouldn't pull out of the
box again for I could see where it had been glued on the inside of the box
and I put it all back together and returned it to the school. The whole
aquarium is on a GFI power strip. Gosh, I hope that is OK.

Anyhow, I added some shrimp to the tank frm my own tank, since everyone has
been out of shrimp for 3 weeks now. So now we have 5 guppies, 4 ottos, 5
cories and 2 shrimp. And I added nitrate to the tank. I saw a bit of green
spot algae on the glass and on the sword leaves which were looking pretty
starved. But it is looking really pretty otherwise.

I've been surprised at how the watersprite roots have emerged from the
gravel, no nutrients down there and precious little in the water column but
for Flourish and Flourish Iron until today. But, it is sort of neat to be
able to look at the fine root hairs. Roots-- might be the topic for the info
wall next week. I've got Marimo balls, riccia, salvinia and various rooted
and stem plants so we have lots of different types of roots to see.

Thanks for your help, Scott.
>
> Message: 7
> Date: Mon, 22 Mar 2004 07:46:50 -0800 (PST)
> From: "S. Hieber" <shieber at yahoo_com>
> Subject: Re: [APD] Taking Things Apart -- Carbo Plus
> To: aquatic plants digest <aquatic-plants at actwin_com>
>
> You're talking about the power cord, right? And not the low
> voltage cord from the control box to the the carbo lock?
>
> I have not actually been inside a Carbo Plus (they're too
> small ;-) ) but a green wire on a power cord is
> conventionally reserved for the Ground connection -- white
> is for Neutral and Black for Hot. An item might run with
> the ground wire broken but the safety that the ground
> connection is supposed to provide is not there, which is,
> if an inernal short devloped and you were touching the
> case, the electricity would short to ground through the
> ground wire instead of through you.. Now, Instead of the
> ground wire, electricity might find that your body is the
> best path to ground. Also, some electronic circuits don't
> function in a stable and reliable way without good
> grounding.
>
> If you can fix it, do it. If not, then get it fixed or
> replace it. It should be an easy fix, remove a small bit of
> insulation from the green insulated wire and reconnect it
> to where it used to be connected -- the stub of the
> original connection is probably still there, as if to say,
> "Hey, over here, the ground connects over here!" Of coure,
> you'll have to gain access to the connections to do this.
>
> Water and electricity are a mix that deserves the utmost
> respect and care.
>
> And always unplug the electrical unit before attempting to
> work on it.
>
> Scott H.
> --- Ann Viverette <annv777 at houston_rr.com> wrote:
> >  Someone mentioned what you can learn by taking things
> > apart... has anyone
> > ever opened up a Carbo Plus unit?
> >
> > I ask because I have one running on that tank in the
> > elementary school, but
> > I am concerned because the cord seems to be not good. It
> > looks like it was
> > tugged on pretty hard at some point and this pulled out
> > at the base of the
> > unit, one wire, covered in green is snapped, and the
> > white cotton-like
> > wrapping shows. It works when I shove the wire back into
> > the unit, but I am
> > nervous about safety. I had to turn the unit up more than
> > I was led to
> > expect to to get less performance that I was expecting. I
> > was given this to
> > use at the school and I hate to look a gift horse in the
> > mouth but I think
> > this horse needs some attention.
> >
> > I do hate electircal work (ever since I shocked the fool
> > out of myself
> > working on a car, welding a ring to my hand) and so I am
> > not eager to open
> > this thing up unless someone who has can tell me that I
> > am likely to be able
> > to open it with out breaking it and be able to strip and
> > reconnect that wire
> > without too much confusion.
> >
> > Any good advice out there?
>
>
> =====
> S. Hieber
> -  -   -   -   -   -   -   -
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> End of Aquatic-Plants Digest, Vol 7, Issue 64
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