Fish tank reno and seseal

[jimmy c]

Lastnight i started a HUGE task of emptying the 72gal, changing the gravel/substrate and resealing 2 of the silicone seals @ the front of the tank.

Got the large Blue buckets from home depot to hold the old substrate, lava rock and for a temporary home for my larger fish. there is a small tank on the floor for the smaller fish. emptied the water from the large tank into the bucket/fish tank, moved the fish and hooked up the filters.

Finished emptying the tank then removed all the substrate. drained the water and cut out the silicone. drank a beer, watched Fringe and went to bed

Got up and started @ it again, cleaned the old silicone off with a razor blade and rubbing Alcohol. Let dry, got out the masking tape, taped up the corners for a nice line up the glass, opened the tube of Silicone and went to work. All was going well except i was not happy with how close I put the masking tape together into the corner so once I siliconed it all i pulled the tape off and "free handed" it. DOH! but whatever, i can live with it.

So now its drying, and i need to clean 100lbs of crushed coral and upload some pics.

ill keep posting and adding pics till the project is finished.

 

[jimmy c]

heres more pics.

 

[jimmy c]

k now i have a question.

In the DIY forum under "special DIY projects" there is a artical about fixing a leaky tank. it says you can cut out the area that is "leaking" PLUS 3 inches on each side, clean and add new silicone.

Ive always been told to cut out ALL silicone (corners, bottom of tank) because the old silicone will not cure to the old stuff. (not the silicone between the glass, just the nice visual seal not the silicone holding the glass together)

i cut the old silicone out in the spots i needed to fix. the tank was not leaking, just visually did not look nice.

am i in any need to worry about the joint where the old and new silicone meet? (i dont mean the silicone between the glass holding it together)

hope it is explained properly :S

 

[mfdrookie516]

imo, it would be best to remove it all and completely redo that joint... not to say it wont work like you're talking about, but its not much more trouble to completely redo it, especially when you look at the peace of mind you'll have not worrying about it leaking

 

[jimmy c]

"completely redo that joint"

Do you mean entire tank or the 1 seal down the corner as the "joint"
i have done both ft corners from top to 1inch to the bottom, im just wondering if this is ok, or should I redo the entire tank (4 corners and bottom) and if the silicone will stick to the older bottom seal.

 

[mfdrookie516]

oh yeah, i mean just one corner... i had to do that on one and it worked fine. im sure its preferred to do the whole thing, but as long as you have the whole joint done, you shouldnt have any problems.. may want to add a little extra where it meets the old silicone on the opposing joint though, i took some sand paper and roughed up the two bottom beads that met the corner where i resealed before i siliconed it

 

[jimmy c]

SWEET! thanks, yeah ive just been under the impression that if u cut 1 "joint" or corner, the whole tank should be done. i think im gonna move the tank to the garage tomorrow just in case and fill it up. better in the garage than the hardwood floor again.........

 

[mfdrookie516]

very true

 

[cjldad]

I always see people talk about just redoing one corner or joint.. But at some point that joint or corner meets in to another corner or joint.. Then the problem with silicone not sticking to silicone comes to mind.. Soooo, wouldn't that area then be crummy?

I think you are doing the best by redoing the whole thing.. I didn't trust myself.. So I sold my tank and got another..

 

[jimmy c]

well, so far the tank is full and in the garage holding water just fine. think tomorrow i will bring it back up and start setting it back up. more pics to follow.

i shoulda done the whole tank again but i bought the tank used from a lfs for 25$ and it had a leaky bottom seal. i cut out the old stuff and sealed it 2 years ago and held just fine. i didnt want to cut it all out again and have the bottom start leaking. i kinda live by the "if its not broken, dont mess with it" rule...

 

[jimmy c]

k, here we are again, water tested the tank in the garage for 3 days and held fine. moved it back to the room and cleaned the crushed coral, put it in, added my lava rock and filled the tank 1/2 full with new tap water.

heres my question:
since i filled it 1/2 full with new tap water, its gonna have clourine etc in it. Im gonna use the water out of the storage bucket with my fish in it and the other smaller tank. will this be enough old water to keep the fish in the large tank ok? im going to take the FX5 off the bucket and start to let it run in the tank soon. do i need to recycle the tank?

what do u guys think?

 

[redneckgearhead]

I would add a dechlorinator to the water. And when you say "tap water" you mean salt water made from tap right? Oh and Why in the world would silicone not stick to silicon? that makes no sense.

 

[mfdrookie516]

its a freshwater tank... i believe he just put plain tap in without dechlorinating it...

 

[redneckgearhead]

oh i see lol guess i shoulda checked that before hand.

 

[mfdrookie516]

so jimmy, are you going to dechlorinate the water before you transfer the filter back over? as long as you do, you might see a mini cycle, but you shouldnt have to worry about much more than that as long as the fx5 has had an ammonia source to keep that bacteria alive...

 

[jimmy c]

yeah i didnt dechlorinate the water. i went in the room yesterday and found 3 fish died overnight ( i have another post re: water parameters in a forum here which is why i started this project to beguin with) in the bucket. so i started to add tap water into the tank about 1/4 full and took old water from the holding tank and bucket and added it to the tank so now its 1/2 full. removed the FX5 from the bucket, added it to the tank and added a powerhead into the tank to help move the water around for airation. topped up the 2 holding tanks with a lil water.

That was all yesterday, ive read posts about letting water sit for 12 hours and thismorning a added a few fish to see how they did. all is good so far and gonna dump all the water from the other 2 holding tanks into the tank and add the fish.