Official Sand Rinse and Tank Transfer thread

[brandon429]

Chris what I like about your work documentation was you used the rule of surface area in that rocks moved over to the new tank are enough filtration and we just don’t need the sand


and you mentioned some medical preps about gloves, with today’s issues revolving around palytoxin and bac infections that can be transmitted to humans occasionally that’s a strong tie-in


and ye cloudless rock transfer will always skip cycle, we won’t lose any transfer jobs if folks will keep up this medical prediction when reefing, thank you tons for posting
b

 

[brandon429]

If this thread was about relocating tanks using some or all old sand, unrinsed, for every 20 jobs on file we’d get reports of massive cyano and gha outbreaks two months later in 10-15 jobs (majority) and total wipeout losses about one or two for every twenty, a small loss minority but nonetheless hundreds or thousands in cash lost even in just one or two losses. Reef tanks are a massive cash aggregate and even though the majority really can transfer tanks with no rinse who wants to be the one or two? You kept our standard of no loss with thorough execution going, well done

at the price of a ton of tap water wasted during rinsing we are approaching fifty pages and no tank loss. For all the scientists out there who rib me for living a life of unscientific reef anecdotes, I’ll take the fifty pages with no loss for $800 Alex.

 

[brandon429]

One reason we keep getting lucky:

Does my decade old sand bed actually nitrify? Who eats Ammonia in our tanks?

The narrative seems to be that dosing organic carbon shifts the microbiome to being more heterotrophic and less chemoautotrophic. This in turn renders two risks. One is altered coral associated bacteria (coral can become sick) and the other is a diminished chemoautotrophic bacteria population...

www.reef2reef.com

Taricha has found wet pack sand to be inert, it’s not really live per the bag label, and even better he found that sand itself isn’t contributing anything to nitrification. That means what we’ve been robbing out of tanks this whole time which I thought was like 40% of someone’s active filtration was indeed about one percent lol

very neat studies there

the live rocks and in some cases moreso the microscopic algae and plants are doing the ammonia work, I didn’t know the plants were contributing this much wow

 

[brandon429]

Seeking Advice on Moving/Removing Sand bed

Hey can you post us an updated pic of the tank we can tell lots about the params from the pics, not the test kits, and any ammonia issues arise within an hour or so if any. They do not wait a day or two to arise, nh3 is a quick killer it’s not a lingering param so pics will show us today how...

www.reef2reef.com

Chris applied skip cycle biology and removed his whole sandbed all at once, total glass bottom skip cycle/clean system worth viewing.

 

[DaveC]

Chris what I like about your work documentation was you used the rule of surface area in that rocks moved over to the new tank are enough filtration and we just don’t need the sand


and you mentioned some medical preps about gloves, with today’s issues revolving around palytoxin and bac infections that can be transmitted to humans occasionally that’s a strong tie-in


and ye cloudless rock transfer will always skip cycle, we won’t lose any transfer jobs if folks will keep up this medical prediction when reefing, thank you tons for posting
b

Were you referring to mine? My name is Dave

 

[twistedfinn967]

@brandon429
I'm glad I found this thread, I spent yesterday reading all 43 pages. My 120g has a slow leak and the replacement tank is enroute, probably be here the end of this week-early next week. I was here on R2R trying to figure out what to do with my sand bed. I'll be rinsing the bejeezus out of it prior to transfer!

The tank was started in November 2017 with "The Package" from TampaBaySaltwater, I'm relieved to know that I don't have to replace the substrate! I'll try to get pics before, during and after the cleansing.

Thank you for the time that you and everyone else have put into this!

 

[brandon429]

Thank you very much for posting my gosh that’s a read marathon thank you again x 3

you bring a rare presentation here: tbs was the sand we were not pre rinsing before adding into tanks



but that sand has now been transformed into reef tank sand, time in tank...mixed with waste, and agree we should rinse now that access is imminent. To move waste to a new tank is to play the loss game, but rinsing is zero coral and fish loss when thorough.

The animals that are selected for in the sand bed mix into the live rock they’re not exclusive. (A reader out there is searching for the Shimek article on rc that says they keep to their own zones am aware)

but we’ve already documented sandbed reseeding from rocks for pods and common worms, and nothing says you cant try and creatively net out some wigglers without waste to move into the new clean system, can do.

in the end, that sandbed diversity was an ideal it’s not required or bare bottom owners couldn’t have nice sps reefs

in the triage now for the system that diversity takes last place to the animals in the upper system, and by blasting the heck out of that sand with tap water for hours final rinse in RO we are by priority removing waste, even if 95% of reefers might could move it all over safely.



One single post of a lost tank would be very sad, that’s someone’s $ and time and animals on the line so until someone invents an extraction mechanism that can be applied for fifty pages safely I say we rinse it in this mode:


thank you much for posting cant wait to see your before and afters

 

[brandon429]

Future Work: Do rip cleans save us from needing future reef work?

Bacteria? Algae? Rip clean didn't fix it (need help)

Hi! I have an IM lagoon 25 that has been running for about 2 years now. I have this weird fuzzy growth on the rock (for about 6 months, doesn't go away on its own). It only grows in the light so its photosynthetic. It has a brownish tinge to it but also can be closer to white. It doesn't grow...

www.reef2reef.com

is that a win or a fail for rip cleaning based on the after pic

that is a perfect example of some growback challenges reef tanks will face. if it was any easier this would be like goldfish keeping but its reefing, some organisms are really well set.

 

[brandon429]

92 Corner Move Thread

Lots of rock/coral buckets.

www.reef2reef.com

Team

TCoach did it he effected a totally cloudless transfer plus tap rinse, and he tracks via seneye so we can watch nitrification effects!

 

[DaveC]

Another no cycle transfer for the books

I upgraded from a 40 breeder to a 150 this past week. I was lucky they were in different parts of the same room.

Basically I built up the 150 over a few days.
Filling took a few days since I was using a 75 gallon per day RODI
I put a heater in there as soon as I had a few inches of water then added another when it was about 1/2 full
As soon as the temp stabilized with the pump & powerheads on, I added IO salt over a few hours to sneak up on the correct salinity.

Once I got the salinity dialed in I added about 30 lbs of rock that I had cooking in the 40 breeder sump in the basement. All of the rock had been in the system since the Eagles win the Super Ball. I basically just swirled the rock in the water to knock off the loose debris. There wasn't really much there so that went pretty quick.

The next morning I added a Chromis as the canary and a few corals. I let him swim over night and everything seemed fine in the morning.

That night after adding the Chromis, I transferred the rest of the rock and corals that was in the 40. Again, I basically just swirled the rock in the water to knock off the debris and placed them in the new tank.

NOTE: If you have bristle worms, you're probably going to want to wear gloves ... ask me how I know.

Now that I had no rocks in the 40, I caught the rest of the fish & acclimated them for about 45 minutes just like you would from a LFS.

Now two days later everything seems good, fish are a little confused but I'm sure they will get used to their new surroundings.

Fish - Chromis, small hippo, pajama cardinal, blenny, 2 clowns. very very light bioload for the new tank.

No sand was transferred and I'm not sure if I'm going to add sand later or not. If I do add sand it will be 'snow globe' clean before I add it. Time will tell what I do.

Rockwork still needs to be done, but that will have to wait until I finish the floor on the other side of the room. I'll post updates on my build thread. Lights are at 40% reduction using Kessils acclimation schedule. They'll ramp up over 2 weeks. I added a cup of TM biopellets this am.

About a month in and zero adverse reactions to the transfer. Had a little brown dust on he glass for a week or so. I am still bare bottom and will stay that way until I get the rockwork sorted.

Nitrate - 3
Phosphate - .052

 

[brandon429]

My move from Texas to NC without losing anything

I decided I would build a thread to talk about moving my reef tank from Austin Texas to Raleigh North Carolina. Before I did the move I search the web for everything. Success stories to failures. I wanted to ensure I would have the highest success rate possible. this is the list of items I...

www.reef2reef.com

****Big Job

thats an interstate move, hours and hours in Brute container holdings, done well

he did not choose to pre rinse the new sand and it still worked out fine, that's a cloudless follow up pic above and that looks just great.

 

[brandon429]

Dave I just barely saw your update as well thank you for that excellent follow up pic you guys’ collective rip cleans in just this recent page has really boosted our diversity in logged jobs and continued updates for outcome tracking

 

[mdh71]

Due to a leak, I need to swap a Red Sea 425 that is around 3 1/2 years old. While I have read a lot of this thread, please forgive me if this has already been answered. The sand in the tank is live Florida sand. There is a lot of life in the sand, plenty of which is unidentified. Reading this thread the overwhelming recommendation is to rinse out the sand with tap water.

Will rinsing with tap water leave decaying worms, and other life forms that will cause problems?


At one time I tried to remove this worm, but was never able to. I took many rocks out thinking it was living in a rock, but I now

believe it lived in the sand. I have not seen this worm for a long time, so I think it is dead, but do not know for sure.


So the real questions is do I rinse or replace the sand?

 

[brandon429]

That’s a big eunicid worm most folks want them gone I think he’ll hole up in a rock.

The tap rinse ejects all life from the sand, leaving only grains and even though that removed life and diversity it removed waste too which is how we get all these different tanks to move successfully

any tap rinse that left dead worms still among the grains wasnt through enough, rinse till it’s only grains.

if you move things over without a rinse then it’s still likely to be ok but there’s a small chance of total loss, such as the examples on page one post one and a total rinse is the only 100% known safe method

 

[brandon429]

its been said that very species is the basis for many folk's nightmares. they've modeled Hollywood monsters off eunicids... tremors. two and three as well. sand rinse thread is also six dgrees from kevin bacon

 

[twistedfinn967]

Well, it was a week ago yesterday that I hot swapped tanks and rip cleaned my substrate. The entire process took a lot longer than I anticipated. This endeavor wasn't a simple rip clean, I swapped tanks and had to re-plumb the new one, a 120 gallon tank. I was shocked at the mud puddle looking water that came from the first bucket, the surprise wore of more each of the next 3 buckets. I finally had the corals and fish in the new tank and was heading to bed at 0245 hrs. To be fair and honest, plumbing the tank took way more time than I expected. I probably had about 2 hours in cleaning the sand. As tired and sore as I was, I am glad I did it.

My only question is how do I go about replenishing the bio diversity that I lost in the rip clean? I know I lost worms but what about the stuff I couldn't see?

 

[brandon429]

I wouldn't mind buying some for my reef tank too. after about 200 rip cleans the pods running a little thin lol

ipsf.com

algen

various refugium charger packs avail online is perfect, something including actual gammarid classic curved pods.

 

[twistedfinn967]

I wouldn't mind buying some for my reef tank too. after about 200 rip cleans the pods running a little thin lol

ipsf.com

algen

various refugium charger packs avail online is perfect, something including actual gammarid classic curved pods.

And the stuff you mentioned is okay to add to the display tank, right? I don't have a refugium, just a sump.

 

[brandon429]

yes they live in the rock crevices etc

id filter it out for mud or clouding components if any, amazon sells netting that can be used for straining if its a muddy mix etc

if its a bag of water bugs, add it

 

[ReefMan692]

I'm a little afraid to apply KOBRA KAI to my tank this time around, since I am dealing with Dinoflagellates. I can't help but feel my aggressiveness in attacking the GHA invader led me to the dinoflagellate issues.

I guess I got too clean, and got obsessed with keeping it clean. Now i'm torn on direct actions. For now I am trying the "dirty tank method" and hopefully the UV will clear it up...

but if a few more weeks go by with no results I am going to be ready to rip the whole thing down again....

I might ditch the sand, start with new "live" rock that's already had all of it's die off happen in a separate culture container, and see where that takes me. That is if the worst case scenario happens.

Not sure how to clean Dino's off the original rocks, Maybe bleach? I don't know allegedly they form cysts and are resistant to sanitization efforts. So far my corals arn't dying or anything I have been messing with lighting quite a bit tho to keep the Dino's at bay, not sure how long I can keep that up before the corals get *****. My new UV is set to arrive tomorrow so wishing for the best.

Stay tuned!