Making water changes easier! What are some tips and tricks?

[revhtree Verified Admin]

Water changes can be brutal and that's one reason some people rarely do them or don't do them at all. Like anything else in life, the easier things get done more often than the harder things and the same holds true to reefing!

I remember the "bucket brigade" days of water changes where there were many buckets and I was the only brigade! :p

Let's help others out today and maybe learn something new!

What are some tips and tricks you have learned to make changing out your aquarium water easier?

image via @MonsterReef

 

[Roytrolls247]

I have a Water mixing station in my garage so mixing water is easy. I just have to lug buckets from the garage to the 2nd floor of my house. It annoying but its not horrible at all..

 

[Biglew11]

i still do the bucket brigade. i use 5 gallon lowes buckets with lids so at least i don't spill water. i have a mark on my sump so i know when to stop adding water. i put my buckets on a high chair we have floating around and siphon it into the sump so the main heavy lifting is from the basement to the highchair in the living room.

 

[TexasTodd]

Best thing I've done is use a Mag Drive 24 with about 70' of 1" tubing to pump both salt and ATO top-off in from the garage. These pumps can pump much further if needed.
In the summer here the garage gets really hot, I would pump to buckets then by aquarium to let the water cool for a few hours. Just had a "duh" moment on R2R a week ago with someone saying they just put in a frozen bottle in for a while before to cool their saltwater ahead of a WC. It works great.

 

[jesspal]

I have a brute trash bin on wheels and use a MJ pump. Makes adding the new water so much easier. Mind you my tank is rather small but should work for larger volume tanks as well.

 

[highest_tides]

Currently on the bucket system and its not too hard because my tank is small. I'm cycling a 165 gallon now where that will change. I plan on setting up a pump for that one..

 

[Millwright]

Water changes at the moment are fairly easy. I have two 35 gallon reservoirs. 1 RODI and one mixed saltwater. RODI gravity feeds into the mixing reservoir when needed. Saltwater mixing reservoir has a mag pump that mixes/ sends water to the display depending on the orientation of the ball valves. The same supply tubing that goes to the display can be disconnected from the pump with quick disconnects. To drain the display I disconnect the hose from the pump and attach a short piece of pipe with a 90° on the end. This allows me to directed it towards the floor drain in the utility room where the siphoned water goes.
Next project is adding unions and a salt injector. I despise adding salt to the mixing reservoir. Between having to kneel on the ground and getting the one cup measuring cup between the top of the salt water reservoir and the shelf above it is a pain. I think I have a solution. I plan on feeding Salt into a horizontal pipe with water flowing through. Kind of like a sand hourglass. I’m going to use a piece of 4 inch pipe with a fill line. Fill line will be the measured amount of salt needed for 35gallons of saltwater. On the pump side it will be 1/2” pvc going into a 3/4 “T”. Thr 4” will be vertically above with a bell reducer to bring it down to 3:4”. Then Im modifying a 3/4” plug to fit inside of the 3/4 plug. I can drill an appropriate sized hole that slows a slow gradual stream of salt. The exit side of the “T” will be 3/4” to hopefully give the pressurized water from the half inside plenty of room to exit and drag the salt with it without pushing back up into the 4”. If this works then I will be able to drain RODI water into the salt mixing reservoir. Fill the 4 inch pipe with salt. start the mixing pump and open the salt drain port allowing it to slowly mix in.
I rated water change poll as a 3. If this mixing plan works I would rate it as a 2. If I can figure a way out to have permanent lines for draining and filling then it would be a 1.
pick is from when I first set up my mixing station.

 

[Everything Aquatics]

25 percent every week on my 20 is very easy. I use one bucket and a pump and I'm done in 5 minutes

 

[WVNed]

Build your water mixing station, sump and utility sink within 5 feet of each other.
Let the Autoaqua AWC move the water around for you a couple of times a day while you do something else or aren't even home.

 

[MnFish1]

1. I make up 40 gallons of saltwater ( Neomarine) - put in a circulation pump and let it circulate overnight (in a Brute trash can)
2. I siphon from the tank (using a Python) - down to a level that I know is 40 gallons (Air does not hurt the corals) - Or I siphon 40 gallons out of the sump if I want to clean that)
3. I screw the python onto the circulating pump - and pump the 'new' water back into the sump with the return pump on.
4. Approx every 2 weeks - it takes about 15 minutes total[/QUOTE][/QUOTE]

 

[Phycodurus]

my water change process is fairly easy IMO

• 20G brute mix barrel right next to my main 180G DT (new ASW is mixed at least two days prior)
• i aim for 10% water changes (about twice a month ideally) and i use two “f-style” water jugs in rotation to siphon out 15G at a rate of usually five minutes per jug (they spill a lot less than an open 5G bucket + they can be capped). so that means just 15 minutes or less to drain 15G.

• once the first jug is filled, i swap in the second jug and scuttle off to the bathroom with the first one to dispose of the old tank water. (single floor SFR; my tank and bathroom are pretty close to each other)
• i use an old large hagen powerhead with 6-7 ft of tubing to refill the tank (about another 10 minutes)

... i have learned not to walk away from the tank during that last step. ;Hilarious;Wideyed


tip: for each new box of salt, i test full water parameters on the very first batch (pH, alk, Ca, Mg, etc.) just to be on the safe side. i also rotate the bag around several times to thoroughly mix that salt.

 

[vlangel]

I had seahorses for over 5 years and the key to successfully keeping seahorses is to limit pathogenic bacteria. A big part of limiting dangerous bacteria is maintaining pristine water conditions, not in terms of parameters but in terms of bacterial count. Big water changes and heavy skimming are key ways to do that.

Since I was not getting any younger I designed a 'no carry, no lift' water change system that I love. I moved my sump tank to the basement directly below my display tank in my livingroom. As luck would have it, there happen to be a cold water line there and a drain! I installed my rodi unit on the wall and I make ro water in a very large brute can. Then I add and mix salt with a mag drive 9.5 pump. That pump also has about 7' of 1" flex tube attached to the output. So all I do is syphon out about 5-7 gallons of water from the sump into a 5 gallon bucket with a hole drilled at the bottom. The hole in the bucket directs the water down the drain. Then I use the magdrive to fill the sump back up with the mixed salt water. I can do the whole process in about 5 minutes and it is the best upgrade I ever made in my 20+ years of reefing!

PS. I thought about doing this for at least 10 years before I pulled the trigger. I did not want to drill holes in our livingroom floor. Now that it's done I have never regretted it!

 

[stanleo]

I have a mixing station in my basement fish room so it's easy to mix and add to the tank, just gets pumped straight from the station into the sump. However getting the water out is a chore because I have to take it out of the DT and dump the water over the deck. Still a lot easier than when I had to make RO water in the bathroom and just hope that I remember that the RO unit is running and not flood my bathroom.

 

[ScottR]

I have a 130ish gallon system. I find making salt the day before makes it much easier. I stick to a Sunday WC schedule and it’s painless. Used to dead WCs but really it’s nothing.

 

[murphy_a]

i still do the bucket brigade.

The bucket brigade lolol that's hilarious.

 

[ScubaFish802]

I still do the one man bucket brigade. I will say that using a return pump to get the water back to the tank has been quite a nice change from dumping it in straight from the buckets very slowly (my back! lol)

 

[Enzodog]

My question is how you heat your water the easiest?

 

[jd371]

Mixing station is in the laundry room and that's not far from the tank's location. I use a 25' Python water changer to drain about 20g from the tank into the slop sink. When finished draining I attach the Python hose to a pump in a 20g Brute that has the mixed water in it and pump that back into the tank. Start to finish about 30 min.
The work shop tank is located out in back of the house so running the python back there is too far. For this tank I have to use buckets but it's not that bad because it's only a 20g. This one takes about 30 min as well, so to do biweekly WC's in both takes an hour.

 

[Phycodurus]

 

[Phycodurus]