Nickel plating safe in aquarium?

[shottsy]

I have a plate coral that I want to grow off of the glass. I purchased nickel plated earth magnets and reef safe epoxy. My intention is to stick the coral to the magnet, and use the magnets to hold the coral in place. Is nickel plating safe in an aquarium or should I encase the magnets in the reef safe epoxy prior to using it in the aquarium?

[Original Fin]

There are multiple layers of plating on those, and one of them is usually copper, nickel is the outside coat. So for that reason, yes, I'd say you should epoxy coat them.

I was looking into this recently myself. The inside wier box for my hang on siphon overflow attaches to the glass with three suction cups, which of course wear out, slide, and generally don't work all that well, especially when the box is full of water, and I need to do a water change. So I thought of these magnets. I haven't pulled the trigger yet because I've been reading that a lot of the DIY epoxy jobs can shrink and crack (exposing metals to corrosion) once you've had them in the tank for a while. There is a company that sells frag racks that come with N43 (I think that's the type?) magnets which they have their own epoxy coatng process for. You can buy replacement magnets from them for their racks, and I would tend to trust those more than DIY. BRS sells them, I believe.

[shottsy]

Thanks for the reply. Don't know if it will help you, but after purchsing magnets and epoxy I found a sight that sells plastic coated earth magnets. (kjmagnetics.com)

[Original Fin]

Yup, I've been to that site. Seems like any of the magnets that would be strong enough for my application are only nickel/copper plated available in epoxy coat, and there is a disclaimer on those that says they don;t guarantee them to be completely waterproof. The plastic coated ones are not plated, so copper would be less of a concern should the coating fail, but those are the weaker magnets that probably aren't up to the task.

With the types of lighting we use, you have to be careful about choosing materials that can stand up to UV. Not all of those epoxy & plastic materials do.