Moving Tank with Sandbed

[jonboyb]

Just found a smokin' deal on a 156 Oceanic that I can't turn down. It's an established tank and has a considerable sand bed. Definantly not an active deep sand bed, but still full of things that probably shouldn't be disturbed. Is there anything that can be done to transport and reuse the sand without possibly crashing the tank? The tank comes with some quite large and expensive fish that I'd rather not kill WAAAYYYY to big to place in my QT even for a short time.

If the sand is unusable, could I set the tank up bare bottom and gradually add new sand? The tank has to be broken down and reset pretty quickly. Thanks.

 

[Ziggy953]

I would not reuse the sand at all. Take a few cups of it and seed your new sand. You can certainly set it up bare bottomed and then add sand. The amount of nasty stuff that is in the sand will cause you more problems then good.

I would pick up a few 32g trash cans from walmart to transport some of the water from the tank so you have water to refill it with quickly. Also the garbage cans are a great way to transport the fish and live rock.

 

[jonboyb]

Already have an assortment of the heavy-duty rubbermaid totes for the fish, LR, water, etc. The sandbed was my only nagging question. Kinda depressing to trash that much sand

Could washing the sand in RO/DI remove enough of the contaminents to reuse it? For the most part the tank is FOWLR and not a reef.....yet...LOL. Not alot of bioload for the volume (200 gallons with the sump and only 4 real fish: 3 large tangs and a big maroon clown). A couple of featherdusters and toadstool leather are the only corals in there.

 

[pat8you]

You might be able to wash it but i would not risk it. Sand is not that expensive and it would be taking a considerable risk to reuse the sand even if you wash it. Like ziggy said you can take a couple cup fulls to help seed the new sand. Unless you want to have a deep sand bed for the filtration and stuff all you really need is around 3/4 of an inch to cover the bottom and look nice.

 

[Ziggy953]

Yes you could wash it. That my friend is a task worth spending the money for buying new sand. I tried it on about 60lbs and it was a total pain in the rear. I vowed to never do that again.

I would just go the more cautious route and get new sand. As Pat said it isn't a major expense when compared to other parts of the hobby.

Oh and get us some pics of this awesome tank as soon as you can!! I'm looking forward to your re-build thread!

 

[jonboyb]

I'm so upset right now. This guy literally lives just down the road from me and someone put a deposit on it before I could get there Check out this link and you'll see why I was so gung-ho.

155 Gallon Reef Aquarium

Talk about missing the deal of the century I could have saved some major dinero starting with that setup. I know great deals pop up all along......but dang, that was a steal....and close.

 

[austinsdad]

8-O Wow! That was a good deal. Sorry you missed that one.

 

[jonboyb]

His Craigslist ad only touched on a few of the things he was including too. Needless to say, his $5500 invested statement was probably a good bit low He bought everything at local stores, so he probably paid well over $1000 for the LR alone.

 

[Ziggy953]

I would contact him and make sure he knows you are interested in case the deal falls through.

 

[jonboyb]

I did. He called me last night to give me the news it was just picked up.

 

[Ziggy953]

Well that just stinks!