Upgrading tank in current tank location soon - need guidance

Hello to All,

The time has come for me to replace my current 29g tank with a slightly larger one. It will be going in the same place as the current tank. Thankfully it is a 50 breeder so it isnt involving a massive amount of water etc.

I will be building a 20L sump w/ fuge - my first one! Special thanks to Mikejrice for his infinite patience and help with all my PM'ed questions! Kacy also gets a thank-you for her help and encouragement as well. Wiigelec has been gracious with explaining how to cut acrylic etc... I am going to be reusing my current Aqua C Remora in it but am laying the sump out to accommodate a new SWC 120 for when I am able to order it. (very excited about that!) The Aqua C will make a nice backup in the event of an emergency or hospital tank etc.

Planned upgrades / changes will be as follows:

- New sump / fuge w/ overflow box on the DT.

- New clean dry rock from RC or BRS (I want to phase some of my current rock out - some pieces are a bit too dense etc.)

- Addition of new sand - reuse current sand in fuge and to seed the new tank.

Question:

Assuming the use of new sand and dry rock, shall I plan around a full cycle for the new tank? Or do I set that up, start the sump up and just dump my current tank water etc in?

I am overwhelmed on how best to tackle this. Like I mentioned to Mikejrice in a recent email - building one's first sump and one's first tank move are both rites of passage in a way and no matter how many others have done it before, no matter how many posts one reads about them - it is still a monumental thing the first time - especially to a total newb like me

That said, I will open the floor for advice from all of you - with a heartfelt thanks.

elizabeth

 

I think if you use the sand and rock from your old tank along with base rock and sand you should have much less of a cycle, but there should still be one.

good luck with your build, i hope you enjoy it.

 

I am also in the process of doing this, and have read/posted many questions. the answer i got from many sources was if you are using 100% new bio filtering (rock/sand/etc) then expect an almost full cycle. But if you can move, even temporarily, a large portion of your current rock to seed the tank. then you will a get minimal cycle. then after a couple weeks for dry rock to establish you can remove your old rock.

also worth noting that if the tank/sump are all new then your going to see some silica leeching no matter what you do and might get a small diatom bloom.

 

Does that mean I cannot put fish and corals back in right away? It is exactly this aspect of it that has me the most daunted by this. Dealing with any kind of a cycle. I will feel rotten if I needlessly lose something to my ignorance / inexperience.

(and thank you!)

 

One more thing, if your sand bed was deep and old, you should be careful when disturbing it. maybe remove livestock first. I have no first hand experience with this but have read that toxic gases may be released.

 

If it were me i would wait a while, if even a week. the rock you currently have will most likely make up a small portion of your total rock, the bacteria would need a little time to populate the entire tank. There could also be some die off causing ammonia to be present.

 

Sandbed is not deep nor not that old. was started mid October of 09. beyond having crap built up in it, I do not see any black spots or whatever. Some pink here and there from cyano but nothing black.

 

congrats on the upgrade Elizabeth, thats brilliant

if it where me I would start here

http://www.3reef.com/forums/reef-aq...g-aquarium-transferring-bigger-one-54342.html

then once I had read that again, this is what I would do

before you start , make at least 30 - 40 gallons of new salt water at least 24 hours in advance

1 - get some large holding tubs, rubber maids, kids toy boxes - anything that will hold water and your livestock
2 - remove the water from your existing set up into the tubs
3 - as the level lowers, start moving live corals into the water containers ( if you do the change over after lights out then corals will be closed up thus easier to handle IME)
4- Continue to syphon and remove the rock again placing in the holding tubs and when the rocks are all gone you can catch the fish and mobile inverts
5- once all rock is out and in the tubs under water, continue to syphon until you get to last inch of water ( Id throw away the old sand except for a couple of scoops for seeding but others do differently)
6- if you have enough tubs . live corals/ fish and rocks can all be seperated and when I did this I ran my skimmer on one of the toy boxes that the corals where in and also plugged in the heater so I could do the work without any panick


move the old tank out the way and move the new one in
1 - add the new base rock
2 - add the 30 gallons of new water
3 - add the new sand bed
4 - then pump water back into the tank from the holding tubs (OK I used a 2 litre jug to move 75 gallons of water back to my DT - the back ached but I felt great when I finished)
5 -then re aquascape using any of the rock your keeping ( this is why I suggested making more water than you need, you lose a bit when you leave the last inch of dirty water in old tank and its better to have to much water than to little IME)
6 - once you have got the rock in- move the corals across
7 - last but not least re introduce the fish and plug everything in and your good to go

by using dry rock and dry sand - and getting rid of your old sand, you should avoid any cycle issues IME and what you have is just a very large water change ( due to the amount of new water you have added)

hope that helps

Steve

 

well Steve seems to have first hand experience with this and his advice is usually solid. I am just paranoid with things like this so i would have waited a little and tested before adding fish. If you plan on adding the fish immediately though, you should make sure your base rock is very clean of any dead organic material.