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Upgrading tank advice


John L

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Hi, I am thinking of upgrading my 94l biocube ( approx 10 months in), to a second hand Red Sea reefer 170.

 

I want to put my rocks/ corals and fish from old tank into new one. Current stock approx 10 -11kg live rock 9 months mature, 1 royal gramma, 1 fire fish, 1 scooter blenny, mix of mushrooms lps, sps, 8 snails.

 

Will I need to run the new second hand tank / cycle it separately first, or if I empty most of my current aquarium water straight in, drop in my bio pellet bags from old tank in new sump and top up with fresh mix, will this be ok for instant cycling? Then check ammonia /nitrites/nitrates etc daily. I estimate I would need extra approx 80-100l fresh salt mix, I use red sea coral pro salt.

 

Will be grateful for any advice.

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burtbollinger

my educated GUESS is you should be OK if everything is transferred rapidly straight in...and not allowed to sit out, etc...so no need to cycle the new tank. Others will chime in, I'm sure.

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burtbollinger

please seek a second opinion...I'm pretty confident I'm right because I've done it myself and I've seen people on here do it, but I dont want to be the one that caused you to have issues.

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I will do mate, it won't be for 2-3 weeksof, I just want to be sure I don't mess it up. I think as it's a minimal upgrade it shouldn't cause too many problems. Gd to know you've done it though. Il get the new tank all ready as poss to go before.

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I've upgraded 3 times now over the years and each time with zero loss with corals and fish. It's not difficult but it will take you most of the day to do.

 

New tank use new sand, do NOT use the old stuff. Save as much water from your old tank as you can, put the fish in corals into a large tub or several with the current tank water. Estimate how much water from the old tank you can use vs the upgrade. Make at least 5-10 gallons more than you think you'll need.

 

After adding the sand, add your established live rock and any new rock you want, add the new mixed water that is matched to temp (SLOWLY add the water). Add your fish and corals and the old tank water.

 

Check out my Deep Blue 80 Breeder build. I have step by step with pics. I went from a non sump 40 Breeder to a 80 Breeder with sump.

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Transfer everything but the sand bed (use new sand). Then top up with new saltwater temp matched. Watch for ammonia spikes. Shouldn't have any die off.

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Use new sand.

 

Drain water from tank into a bucket, put corals and fish in it with a heater.

 

Drain remaining water into another bucket and place rocks in there(keeping them wet will prevent die off)

 

I personally prefer putting my rocks on the glass with eggcrate cut to rock size, its safer and causes no rock tumbling, then add the new sand. If its not livesand it needs washing first to reduce the dust storm.

 

If adding additional rocks, don't add liverock unless its 100% cured. Add dry reef rock or caribsea life rock. This won't cause a cycle. Caribsea life rock has bacteria already in it which will be a bonus.

 

Add the bucket of water from rocks to tank, add newly made water, start placing corals and fish in the tank and add the remaining water they were in.

As long as the water in the buckets from original tank isn't full of detritus it should be safe to use.

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Thanks for the advice everyone.

 

I'm also thinking of going sand bed free too, which will be a gd time to do it, people say bare bottom = less crap/ detritus biluild up.

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With a barebottom you don't have to worry about sand accumulating detritus with nutrients building up but you will still need to vacuum up the detritus that builds on the glass

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I just did a transfer to a new tank when I moved last weekend. Due to some unforeseen issues, everything ended up in a bucket with a heater and a powerhead for two days. I used new water and new sand in the new set-up and haven't had any loss of life.

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If you keep the bioload and amount of live rock the same as the previous tank, you should be fine. I have done this several times now and never had a problem.

 

I have used all new water as well as a mixture of old water/new water when upgrading/moving tanks. I have never had any issues with either method. Just be sure to match temp and salinity with your first tank.

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  • 3 weeks later...

I finally did the upgrade to the reefer 170, so far so good (1st day so touchwood). It was a logistical challenge so thanks to everyone for the advice. This will be my last upgrade for a looong while. Really amazing tank from my 94l bio reef, glad I bit the bullet.

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It may be bigger, but it sure is nice looking! It looks so much more sturdy, too. Those big tanks on little stands make me nervous, especially since I live in earthquake country!

 

Congrats on the upgrade!

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It may be bigger, but it sure is nice looking! It looks so much more sturdy, too. Those big tanks on little stands make me nervous, especially since I live in earthquake country!

 

Congrats on the upgrade!

Thanks, I know what you mean, the smaller tank stand felt top heavy, and I was careful not to keep its door open too long I case the whole thing colapsed!

The 170 does feel like it's built to last many years. Really looking forward to getting my new tank running well and of course more space = more corals

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Seems like you've gotten good advice here already and your move went fine. I've moved my tanks many times, usually in trash cans and buckets over the course of moves with no issues. Swapping between two tanks next to eachother should be a non-event. The only thing that I would add is that if you opted for a new sand bed, monitor for parameter swings after the fact -- your sand bed is a biological filter just like the live rock and you run the risk of overloading your rock's capacity in the short term while the new bed re-seeds. FWIW, I've always transferred my sandbeds without a problem, with the caveat that I don't run deep sand beds.

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Thanks for the advice Aaron ,Just incase, I did add a bottle of colony marine nitrifying bacteria, and a brick size of continuum exxodus bac in sump( hard to believe but meant to have the same surface area for bacteria as using 960kg of live rock and recommend by my lfs). I definitely be testing my water, and will gradually up my feeding to help with building the bacteria back up.

 

In the pic I transferred my chaeto so hoping to use the main sump as a refugium as opposed to running a skimmer. I'm sure this helped my (now) little 94 l loads.and I like the idea of using these natural filters like in waste treatment centres.

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so good, i like it

do you use siporax in your sump?

 

The I think it Is siporax ( Ive never heard the name until now!), it came from my old tanks rear chamber. Ive transferred it over to help seed the continuum bac brick and the new tank/new sand etc. Il probably remove the 2 bags over a number of weeks to make more space in my sump.

My water params are looking good so far, 0 nitrites/ 0 nitrates, fish seem happy all good ( ).

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The I think it Is siporax ( Ive never heard the name until now!), it came from my old tanks rear chamber. Ive transferred it over to help seed the continuum bac brick and the new tank/new sand etc. Il probably remove the 2 bags over a number of weeks to make more space in my sump.

My water params are looking good so far, 0 nitrites/ 0 nitrates, fish seem happy all good ( ).

so good ;)

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