Setup to remove water from Aquarium

[Protodad]

Hey all, I have a water change setup in the garage to mix and pump water to my tank. Problem is, I haven’t found an effective method for getting water out.

I normally use one of those gravel vacuums that has to be started by siphon. Problem is that it’s slow and gets clogged often. How do people normally remove large amounts of water (20+ gallons) while still being able to clean up the sand? I see a lot of people use the python attachment, but the closest sink doesn’t have the ability to connect an adapter to it and the tank location basically requires the drained water to go into a brute trash can (which is fine, i just don’t want to sit for 20 minutes with a crappy siphon).

 

[TangerineSpeedo]

I tend not to use a gravel siphon anymore. I have lots of micro brittles that I end up sucking up, then I have to pull them out of the bucket later. So I just use a large turkey baster and stir up part of my sand every week and get the detritus floating in the water column. You could then use a Sicce zero pump or similar to remove the water out of your DT into a brute. I use a AQQA from amazon I think I got for $20. It will pump out 20 gallons in a couple minutes

 

[kelseytcole]

I tend not to use a gravel siphon anymore. I have lots of micro brittles that I end up sucking up, then I have to pull them out of the bucket later. So I just use a large turkey baster and stir up part of my sand every week and get the detritus floating in the water column. You could then use a Sicce zero pump or similar to remove the water out of your DT into a brute. I use a AQQA from amazon I think I got for $20. It will pump out 20 gallons in a couple minutes

I don't use gravel siphon anymore either.
But for this: AQUA from amazon, thank you very much, I'll try!

 

[mike550]

@Protodad I think you’re in a bit of a Catch-22. If you want to vacuum the sand bed then you’ll need slower flow or you risk sucking a lot of sand out. If you want fast, I connected a PVC assembly to a small Lifegard pump. Basically, the pump sits about 12” below the water line and the U shape of the PVC brings the water up and over which is then connected to a hose. With the pump I can take 20G out of my 120 in a few minutes.

 

[Protodad]

@Protodad I think you’re in a bit of a Catch-22. If you want to vacuum the sand bed then you’ll need slower flow or you risk sucking a lot of sand out. If you want fast, I connected a PVC assembly to a small Lifegard pump. Basically, the pump sits about 12” below the water line and the U shape of the PVC brings the water up and over which is then connected to a hose. With the pump I can take 20G out of my 120 in a few minutes.

Sounds like what I need. Any chance you have a picture of the setup?

 

[mfinn]

I use a Python Water Change hose.

 

[exnisstech]

I don't vacuum as Im barebottom. On my larger system my changes are done in the basement where the sump is. I just syphon water out and pump new water in. I Can do a 25 gallon water change in about the time it takes to finish a drink. It's my quite time down there and I actually enjoy doing water changes. I know weird hu ;)

 

[MoshJosh]

If you want to gravel vac I would use a python style gravel vac but just run it to syphon, not the sink (though I did modify a python to be about 50' of hose to an upstairs sink and it worked fine (but wasteful). I would vac the gravel then use a clamp (either a reef safe one or clamp high enough that it's not touching the water) to hold the python above the sand and a bit above the desired water level (just above the amount of water you are looking to change. Again I would just have this running to syphon the whole time (I ran the hose to my backyard in my FW days to water the grass)

That OR could just stir some of the sand bed (I used an aquascaping spatula tool) then start the water change and run super fine mechanical filtration for a few hours after water change and throw it out after that.

Hope all that makes sense and is helpful.