Official Sand Rinse and Tank Transfer thread

[ScottJ]

Don't have radio, so would a good live rock rinse be declorinated tap with salt added?

Whatever you use for saltwater in your tank will work.

You should save up your pennies for an inexpensive RODI. If you only need a few gallons a week for water changes and top offs, you don't need a big expensive one. And with light use, the filters last quite a while. It can make a huge difference in your tank.

 

[Unitylover]

Whatever you use for saltwater in your tank will work.

You should save up your pennies for an inexpensive RODI. If you only need a few gallons a week for water changes and top offs, you don't need a big expensive one. And with light use, the filters last quite a while. It can make a huge difference in your tank.

Yea, but my budget isn't massive, and I doubt my parents would even care about using it.
So I'll just clean with salt treated water.
Does it have to be the same salt level as my tank? Or can I skimp out a bit? Trying to save salt.

 

[brandon429]

Be sure and pick four or so jobs from here, any page, and copy them

That way you don't rinse the rocks, we've not been doing that for pages and pages
If you'll copy any four jobs, how they took down and stored animals, cleaned, verified, reassembled, dropped the light levels in the new tank. It's OK to decrease rocks by that degree that's not a big loss

You'll only rinse sand in tap water not the rocks per the jobs you select to copy. The reason you're selecting four recent jobs to copy is so that the disassembly reassembly process becomes patterned, if we missed recapping here such as the light level drops it could cause a problem

But if those successful jobs are studied and copied other than the final rinse being in tap water/ you could just buy three gallons of distilled/ copy the jobs perfectly and it'll skip cycle for sure.

 

[brandon429]

What's the reason you did a rip clean, let's see before pics

 

[Unitylover]

What's the reason you did a rip clean, let's see before pics

Long time of no water changes or maintenence, like a year...

 

[Unitylover]

Be sure and pick four or so jobs from here, any page, and copy them

That way you don't rinse the rocks, we've not been doing that for pages and pages
If you'll copy any four jobs, how they took down and stored animals, cleaned, verified, reassembled, dropped the light levels in the new tank. It's OK to decrease rocks by that degree that's not a big loss

You'll only rinse sand in tap water not the rocks per the jobs you select to copy. The reason you're selecting four recent jobs to copy is so that the disassembly reassembly process becomes patterned, if we missed recapping here such as the light level drops it could cause a problem

But if those successful jobs are studied and copied other than the final rinse being in tap water/ you could just buy three gallons of distilled/ copy the jobs perfectly and it'll skip cycle for sure.

So basically, you mean find 4 jobs ans copy them?
I kinda have a plan rn.
A day before, I'll take out all the rock, while doing a water change to minimize detritus and/or ammonia spikes. Most rocks washed with tap, one will be cleaned in tank water then will soak in it. Aquascape will be thought out, not gonna feed her.
The next day, I'll store the fish in a large bowl, and clean the tank dry. I'll then add the rinsed sand. After that, ill put the rock back and the new aquascape, and I'll put tiara (my clown) back in after an hour or so of settling. I'll also add a ton of fluval cycle, since its both 3 dollars for an Oz (all I need) and plenty capable!
Any changes you think to make, other than reading more posts?

 

[brandon429]

Hey that is a really really really good job for this thread, I want those exact tanks

Plus I'll link your work once completed to a fully different large thread where we study just that kind of setup/ full tank rehab eutrophic setups.


Full breakdown based on the unique fit for that job here:

Interestingly, your filter bacteria won't be harmed before or after

Yes to some rock rinsing in this case, a rare case. We want that rock initially rinsed externally and also use a knife to precision detail scrape clean attachments.


then set rocks off to the side totally cleaned and ready, but, leave some coralline areas unburned if possible/ any good spots you can leave to grow onward

but that rock deep clean will fit our work here because you're doing something that if polled, 99% of reefers would say will kill your tank


But we're about to save it, and it'll shine shocking, which is what makes up our thread. That contrast to the common rule is the source of fun :)

so yes agreed work the rocks, leave out what you want. Don't use bottle bac, the resulting good tank will be a testament to the strength of filter bacteria and it'll support findings from that guys article too.




You can put some diluted peroxide on spots as well as you clean the rocks externally, sounds rough but your bacteria are tougher. The key is removing all blanketing growths from plant material and cyano that are covering the reef surface area


*once cleaned, this is exactly like a new mouth with new teeth it's exactly like rasping flushing precision reef dentistry. The tank will begin to regrow some areas: rip them clean forcefully and drive total compliance, allow no backslide and the reef will be permanently fixed and it'll be easy to prevent takeover with less lighting power in play after the clean up


Be sure and cover fish, they jump, match temp and salinity in the new/old water. No other params need to match. Do change all water, use no old water


The key on your rocks is we aren't submerging in tap water for three hours, it's a few mins blasting and pick work, then back in tank/dechlor is too quick to do much harm. The physical work of rinsing and picking removes more bacteria via sloughage than the peroxide and tap will.

That degree of work is worth a full breakdown, good fun here.


The key to total slay win is the contrast

The after pic has to be so clean the tank looks empty, when the system is taken apart use a razor and detail all the glass off inside, then take outside and rinse off, towel dry it to check for missed calcified areas scrapable

Once the tank is that clean, you'll set pre cleaned rocks on pre rinsed sand, in new water, and it'll be glass clear. If you under rinse the sand it'll ruin the effect even a 3% haze isn't a shock. I'd use wet packed live sand that's what every job here is. We still rinse it

 

[Unitylover]

Hey that is a really really really good job for this thread, I want those exact tanks

Plus I'll link your work once completed to a fully different large thread where we study just that kind of setup/ full tank rehab eutrophic setups.


Full breakdown based on the unique fit for that job here:

Interestingly, your filter bacteria won't be harmed before or after

Yes to some rock rinsing in this case, a rare case. We want that rock initially rinsed externally and also use a knife to precision detail scrape clean attachments.


then set rocks off to the side totally cleaned and ready, but, leave some coralline areas unburned if possible/ any good spots you can leave to grow onward

but that rock deep clean will fit our work here because you're doing something that if polled, 99% of reefers would say will kill your tank


But we're about to save it, and it'll shine shocking, which is what makes up our thread. That contrast to the common rule is the source of fun :)

so yes agreed work the rocks, leave out what you want. Don't use bottle bac, the resulting good tank will be a testament to the strength of filter bacteria and it'll support findings from that guys article too.




You can put some diluted peroxide on spots as well as you clean the rocks externally, sounds rough but your bacteria are tougher. The key is removing all blanketing growths from plant material and cyano that are covering the reef surface area


*once cleaned, this is exactly like a new mouth with new teeth it's exactly like rasping flushing precision reef dentistry. The tank will begin to regrow some areas: rip them clean forcefully and drive total compliance, allow no backslide and the reef will be permanently fixed and it'll be easy to prevent takeover with less lighting power in play after the clean up


Be sure and cover fish, they jump, match temp and salinity in the new/old water. No other params need to match. Do change all water, use no old water


The key on your rocks is we aren't submerging in tap water for three hours, it's a few mins blasting and pick work, then back in tank/dechlor is too quick to do much harm. The physical work of rinsing and picking removes more bacteria via sloughage than the peroxide and tap will.

That degree of work is worth a full breakdown, good fun here.


The key to total slay win is the contrast

The after pic has to be so clean the tank looks empty, when the system is taken apart use a razor and detail all the glass off inside, then take outside and rinse off, towel dry it to check for missed calcified areas scrapable

Once the tank is that clean, you'll set pre cleaned rocks on pre rinsed sand, in new water, and it'll be glass clear. If you under rinse the sand it'll ruin the effect even a 3% haze isn't a shock. I'd use wet packed live sand that's what every job here is. We still rinse it

Kk. I'll get Fiji pink sand btw.
After thus, I will show an after!

 

[GARRIGA]

Specific to the sand. Why not run a diatom filter while stirring the sand before removing and giving it the tap cleansing?

Seems like a lot of work and wasted tap and effort just to rid the sand of sediment. Lower the water volume and worse case needs to change/recharge the filters or better yet go @Paul B style and utilize 1 to 10 micron cartridges in Big Blue filters which take longer to clog than old DE yet will get rid of all if not most of the sediment. Could do one final tap water rinse just in case but considering it gets down to 1 micron how would one know they removed anything further? Plus this way you are pretty certain at a minimum that water and sand was filtered down to 10 micron or lower.

Haven't read every page therefore if already mentioned then I'm just confirming it .

 

[brandon429]

it won't work like our method, it only seems like it will. Paul uses rugf, that allows detritus dispersal that no other tank here is safe in enduring because his waste is oxygenated and reduced. that's #1 reason it wont work, our way is the only safe way for the masses who compile waste on the bottom of the tank, within stratified oxic layers etc.

but, our approach might inefficient/that needs to be tested in order to evolve this process agreed. all techniques can be honed.


to test that theory: someone make and run a competing tank transfer thread where you promise to harm nobody's reef...by page ten, we'd know if the theory was solid for the masses

https://www.reef2reef.com/threads/tank-transfer-and-cycle.1091619/
that's an example of a non crash, but also an unhappy reefer pretty much and the after pics don't match our collection

any method that mixes around waste in a tank after setup routinely causes invasions, coral degradation / irritation etc. but any method that gets our results with thousands of gallons of less water used for same safety: I'm for it. evolution is slow here because these jobs are other people's tanks, it's not safe to experiment there imo. we trade off efficiency and gallons totally wasted down the rinse drain for complete recycle control.

 

[GARRIGA]

Not sure I follow in needing a RUGF. I'm talking about at time of sand cleaning leave it in tank and do the rinsing there by using fine micron sediment filtration. Everything else stays the same. All rocks removed and in tubs as you do otherwise.

I've done this in the past when I used to think one needed to frequently clean the gravel but instead of using fine micron that was done with a canister and heavy packed floss which eventually clogs and filters down to finer micron. Only because I couldn't obtain a DE filter. This was the 80s. Also did it with corner filters absent carbon and just packed thick with floss. Not as good as DE or Big Blue but surprisingly it got my water sparkling clean and this was done on various tanks from UG to corner to HOB. Crazy times thinking gravel needed cleaning as a periodic maintenance on my part.

 

[ReefTanker91]

Brandon I wanted to thank you for all of the time you take to respond to everyone in great detail.

I’m upgrading from an 82 gallon to a 120 gallon 4 foot tank soon. I will be replacing the sand with new sand as well. My current tank shad been up and running from May 2024.

I purchased and scaped Tampa Bay Live rock which now has a lot of corals on it as well as ones that came on the rock I would like not to lose. The rock was also teaming with many different detritus worms and other filter feeders.

From my old tank in terms of equipment I will be reusing my Nero 5’s, skimmer, media reactor, and doser and lights. Regarding the equipment, should I give them a deep clean, specifically the Nero’s, media reactor, and skimmer?

I am worried about working on the rock. There are sections of rock that has gha, as well as some briopsis. There are also a few aipstasia, some very large. I have also attempted removing them with Berghia twice but no luck yet.

I would like to list the steps I think I should take and see if you see anything I need to improve.

1. One day prior to swapping tanks, rinse new sand fully. Store sand in container with fresh saltwater.

2. One day prior to swap, remove skimmer, media reactor, and Nero 5’s for deep cleaning using white vinegar food grade. Final rinse under tap water and dry. I would do this the night before the swap.

3. Night before the swap prepare large tote container with fresh saltwater water for live rocks including putting a heater and pump.

4. Morning of swap prepare container for fish with fresh salt water. Include heater and pump and only put fish in once at 78 degrees. What else should I put in this container to keep ammonia at bay and fish not stressed.

5. Prior to taking live rock out of the tank I would like to blast all the surfaces I can with a turkey baster. Then take out the live rock and put into container.

6. Catch all of the fish, cuc, and put them into the container. Blackout out container to prevent stress. I would think this includes running a net through the sand bed to catch all of the brittle stars, spaghetti worms and feather dusters as well.

7. Clean live rock. My live rock is scaped into two large pieces as you can see in the video I linked below. I need to be careful as it was really tedious putting it together and I don’t want to break anything. I would have a 32 brute trash can ready with fresh salt water to dump and pull out the whole piece multiple times to clean out any other detritus rocks pores. Will my attached corals be okay?

8. Cleaning live rock continues with placing rock on table and using a knife, or dentist tool to remove gha, as well as the aipstasia I can see. Spray peroxide mix onto cleaned sections. How long can the rock be out of the water for?
Once done place back in original container.

9. Pour rinsed sand into new tank. Place in live rock. Fill tank with fresh saltwater. Put in cuc followed by fish.

10. Modify lighting schedule to 6 hours a day with a 60% acclimation for a few weeks.

Link to tank video


Please let me know if am missing any steps or should do something differently.

 

[brandon429]

That's a really really nice system above, the colors pop and we want that job here so much because making these plans is high pressure

Time, cash, corals on the line all for one single move that must must end in a fully controlled skip cycle, no chance for fail

Yes, this is for sure going to work: your list is great, that's every detail we've been working on so far captured just right above

*need a few hours over time today to update specifics on your list between things at work. I'll hop on and finalize plans then when you run all this, the feedback will be gold for readers to use in planning future big jobs

To start, two points

On a separate thread that's been waiting three years for participants, there's a powerful way to remove aiptasia nobody uses, that I want to track. Perfect for here


Take a rock sitting on counter

A sharpened and cleaned-tip flathead screwdriver from the garage, a nice sharp point: using hand force or the tapping from a hammer, literally and with precision jam the blade end up under the anemone, by force through the rock (it's not concrete hard, a screwdriver will fracture it easily)

Dig out the anemone, and the attachment rock it came in on, leaving a little hole like a golf divot, in any place there's an aiptasia

If it's in a crevice, shove that screwdriver tip firmly down into the crack and dig it out anyway.

Rinse off the sections dug with old saltwater or new, and plant a coral in the hole then set the rock aside for use after this detailing.

*this removes pedal attachment tissue and can't be beaten for aiptasia removal. Injections, boiling, pastes, animals, may work but they leave bits of tissue for regeneration, this won't, I've used it for decades it works.


Small tweaks coming to the list later today but two high points were aiptasia, and how long can rocks be worked without loss of corals in the air.

a long time, longer than we feel comfortable, is how long the corals can be in the air and still be OK. But if you use a mister bottle with clean saltwater in it, they can go half a day / which we wouldn't need that long / but they can

You can mist saltwater on the exposed surfaces as you do the detail work

And for fun direct examples of how long rocks and corals can sit in the air, here's my own pico reef full of lps and sps monti and some cheaper acros getting drained with no water support, pure cold air contact, for 33 mins in one straight video take to show air stress ability of any reef:



Next day, opens as usual






So we won't subject your rocks to that much stress, but you can see if we did they'd be OK.

More small details coming later on this morning, thanks so much for posting!

 

[oldmonk]

@brandon429
I am going through your sand bed rinse thread. But in my case i want to go bare bottom from my existing sand bed plus get rid of aiptasia infestation that has slowly begun.

Read the thread by @JD_lnshore, where he did a clean up for shroom take over.

In my case, would you mind guiding me for going bare bottom from sand bed and aiptasia fight.
FYI, my tank is around 2.5yrs old and there are some corals that have started encrusting on the rocks and some on back wall . How can that be dealt with if they need to be kept alive for transfer? Reason, we do not get corals easily in this part of the world.
And lastly, what abt the scape? after taking it down, it's gng to be difficult or may be impossible to build the same scape.

thanks

 

[brandon429]

For sure this can be done

It used to be the understanding in reefing that sandbed bacteria were an integral link in the biosystem, needing to be replaced if removed/ killed to maintain system balance

Not so

The sandbed bacteria are tolerated, as a collective mass the extra bacteria in the sand compete for systemic oxygen, they produce waste acids like any respiring organism and they're actually quite a collective risk during power outages, for those same reasons. So to be free of those bacteria via sandbed removal isn't harmful at all. We can go instantly bare bottom in reefing with no harm to the system because we're careful with live rock bacteria and as long as we're cloudless during the process, sensitive animals need to be removed and held elsewhere while we work


Can you post a picture of the system, we're assessing surface area details for the planning

If you can remove any rocks currently, you can practice that surgical aiptasia removal detailed above. You could be getting done what's possible to scrape off before the big switch time

 

[oldmonk]

Many thanks for responding .
I am attaching a small video of my system. The clarity may not be upto the mark , so if you need a much clear video pls let me know. Also this video is of Nov/dec 2024,so some corals are gone and some have more have been added.

Your thoughts/suggestions on further plan of action would help.

 

[brandon429]

Wow, that's serious serious business reefing above that looks like a zoo exhibit wow! Working dual custom runs here/ love it/ so am circling back to @ReefTanker91 plus these small details might impact your planning @oldmonk

Rt91 in your list, list #5 to stir up detritus so it'll be removed when you finally drain the tank: that's coming before step #6 to remove fish, meaning there'll be cloudy water before you remove them, that needs fixed. No detritus clouding permitted around animals

Since you are doing the ordered, disassembly cleaning on a nano I'm confident this little adjust will be perfect. If you can set one decent sized well- cleaned and prepped rock into any holding bin in the center it will keep the ammonia from rising without having to use additives we're not sure of for the protection (such as prime or bottle bac, we never used them here)

OM

That system is huge, huge. One of the biggest jobs if not the biggest here, due to that massive wonderful fish diversity and a lot of rocks and corals- the value of these two reefs coming up for surgery is really amazing I'm simply lucky to have these two plans in action.

This big system bed removal has extra variables compared to other jobs here, we need to make a couple unique planning choices at the start here.

The firm reliable rule for cycle control during materials handling is that ALL home reef systems stack surface area and bioload in the display, in similar ratios of life to water to rock regardless of tank size, making my puny one gallon reef behave exactly the same under surgery like this giant big tank will do. The ratio is what links our two opposite tanks into the exact same cycle control rules, to the degree anyone who owns a seneye is welcomed x1000 to test the post transfer and tell us about ammonia. Only seneye though, no api ammonia relays allowed (causes fear in the masses whereas for sixty pages we're fear free)

We have never asked for, nor received ammonia testing in this entire thread for that reason-》 we already know what the cycle outcome will be if cloudless work (around the animals) is effected and this is assured for that giant system above just the same.

*to use old tank water in the system with animals gone already is a really good way to rinse off live rock and make use of that water before discarding* but your job brings in the very real possibility of fish disease planning as a new safety variable we must factor here

Ive observed and have mentioned in discussions with Jay from the disease forum am seeing upticks of latent disease outbreaks in large multifish system transfers to a higher degree than normal and this isn't happening in clown/goby setups. It's those tang communities and angels and such, somehow tomonts and such that were originally suppressed express soon after the transfer in growing cases

The actual work being planned can cause outbreaks of latent disease in these specific type setups having nothing at all to do with recycling and nobody knows why. I catch the patterns by doing follow ups with these jobs here

Something about the current stasis of the system, with that degree and speciation of fish with fast pure currents, very busy very healthy setup in motion: actual disease suppression is at work in this ecosystem and it's relative to the degree of initial disease planning given to this system potentially.

If you practiced true fallowing of entrants into another tank as monthslong observation before installing here, that's less systemic loading for disease factors

Same with pre treated or observational quarantine for the fish, if they're prepped there's less chance of carry over expression in the final setup, these small fish risks must be considered. If the system isn't disease prepped but running on sheer skilled balance in that tank + with quality live rock obviously carrying it all/ good feed and strong clean currents, then I must assess via insurance actuary in my mind a risk of 25% for delayed onset crypto battles. Helpful in planning access decisions here


*Size of this job*

That's going to require help it seems, merely lifting that tank for cleaning out, all the plumbing, the cleaning and disassembly work, that's two days minimum it seems? Multiple holding tanks with cleaned detailed live rock inside as mini systems while you hold fish etc, big big big work for sure.

If we do a takedown of a tank to access its surfaces for transfer cleaning or handling, the whole system is cleaned out including pumps, tank walls etc so that we can get all the waste out and none will remain to cloud the refill. That seems daunting here, the degree of teamwork it'll need to safely handle all those materials glass/ rock/ bulk water we'd need to have ready for the refill

You may want to incorporate some aspect of capturing half that water for reuse, for example. In most jobs here we just make all new water matching temp and salinity, but this job is mighty big

I'm bordering on wondering if we should simply spot vacuum remove sections of the sand over time, spread out time, something we never do but in this case is indeed a possibility

In- tank sandbed removal will never be as safe and predictable as surgical takedown like we do, but a balance of practicality might be needed here.

What's your brainstorm knowing all that so far

 

[brandon429]

OM for sure the surface area of the rocks alone will skip cycle even that big tank. There are indeed long term benefits for being bare bottom in that tank, agreed by year 7 the waste in it will be causing problems if it's not routinely cleaned. 100% certain there is no surface area risk after seeing the layout. Our challenge is true cloudless separation of animals from the takedown process

Or

We do the sectioned removal which I honestly feel is lower degree risk but factored against a four person, twelve hour job might be preferable depending on access to help, access to having multiple holding tanks heated and readied for those fine fish might be a weeks prep by itself.

The absolute bottom line safest is the full disassembly rip clean: it will always always skip cycle. I'm usually harping warnings in threads about sectioned removal because they're usually working on a nano where such a shortcut isn't needed, and they have a really deep old sandbed we can see waste pocketing in

That's risky to be disturbing in sections

But you showed a rare presentation, opposites in fact: swift swift flowing currents. Fish so big one tail swipe aimed at the substrate kicks up a snowglobe grain kickup, then it falls right down

That shallow bed is busy, aerated not stagnant so it's detritus is reduced compared to typical funk we pull from bottom layers. Predictably sectioned removal will not harm but unequivocally it's not a safe as the surgical run that will copy into any system if the access work required is practical

 

[oldmonk]

@brandon429

Thanks for that detailed write up and also big thank you for liking my set up. To be honest 60x24x24" is very basic as compared to the sizes you guys got over there.

Now coming to the point, if i decide take the route that you have suggested, for sure it will take time as well as extra man power, and lot many extra items. The availability of all the mentioned things is not very great. All this with the risk of losing corals:( ( as is getting them is difficult here).

The fish disease aspect is something which even i was contemplating . This thing is very risky as we do not get medicines here readily and if some unknown stuff crops up, i am doomed. We do not have our JAY here to help

So the sand bed removal part , as you rightly suggested is to start from corner and take out in parts on weekly basis. Even i was thinking on the same lines. Since i siphon gunk from the sand every 15 days during water change, it should show mercy while taking out.
Once that is achieved take a break of say 10-12 days , observe how the tank is behaving and start for aiptasia eradication.

For aiptasia , i think i will siphon out arnd 250-300 litres of water and keep it aside.Divide this qty in 2 parts and divide the fish equally in this water . What say? . Take out another 75-100 litres and use this water for cleaning rocks one by one which can be taken out without disturbing the scape. There are some loose rocks. Will this help? Rocks to be place immediately in position once scrubbed clean
You have mentioned to use surgical knife, screwdrivers etc to dent the rocks where aiptasia is , but what if they are minute /tiny and can't be seen once rock is out?? I suppose scrubbing is the only solution!!

Same way i can adopt for plumbing and equipment in the sump. Will it work? Will i be able to eradicate infestation this way?

Lastly what about the overflow section? Some folks says aiptasia is good in overflow. But isn't it easy and natural to get carried over into the display???




Thanks

 

[oldmonk]

Awaiting your inputs on the above!!

thanks