How to Move an Established aquarium

[greaver83]

I need to move my 75 gallon tank from part of the living room to another part of the living room. we upgraded tv's from an old school floor model to a hang on the wall flat screen so now my aquarium needs to go where the old tv was and my couch needs to be where the aquarium is so i can move in my living room. I have 2 hob filters one 10-20 and another 40-60 on the back with good bacteria and all in it and sand substrate any advice on how to move my tank i live in the country and have excellent tap water would i want to drain all the water and replace or would i want to some how keep all the current water and re fill with it any help would be awesome i really dont want to kill off my fish

 

[Scouser]

Well if it's possible I'd remove about half the water and try to move it with the help of some friends.

I know it'll still be heavy as **** but it's worth trying.

 

[greaver83]

thats what i was thinking im a big guy and i have a friend who could help me pick the stand and tank up at the same time but im scared of cracking the tank ive heard to many horror stories about moving tanks with water in em

 

[maxwellag]

I have done maintenance on my tanks by siphoning water from the tank into a big bucket and then putting some of the fish (sorted by school or aggression, because smaller space could multiply the aggression) so you might want a few buckets ... then move the filter pads into the buckets (not the filter, unless the bucket is square shaped, so a filter can hang on the edge) and move the tank, then move the filter pads back, and either dump the water from the buckets back into the tanks, or get rid of it and do a water change...
During this, I would drain more than half of the tank, to make it lighter and easier to move, and also less risky.

 

[Scouser]

thats what i was thinking im a big guy and i have a friend who could help me pick the stand and tank up at the same time but im scared of cracking the tank ive heard to many horror stories about moving tanks with water in em

I'd try anything I could to save ripping the tank apart.

Maybe give it a go but be really cautious about sloshing the water.

 

[tmfish]

I had to do the same thing but it was from the front room to the living room. You do not want to move the tank with alot of water in it. it might crack.

Here's what I did. The tank was a 90g. I filled a 55 gallon brand new garbage can with all the water I could. Drain the rest of the tank and put all the fish in the garbage can. Get yourself those little plastic furniture movers that you can slip under the feet of your fish tank stand and slowly slide the whole setup to the new place. This worked very well for me. Add water and fish, top the tank off setup filters and your done. only took 2 hours to accomplish and went very smooth. GOOD LUCK

 

[greaver83]

ok so it has began i have several planstic tupperware bins i cleaned them out well with just water nothing has ever been in em tooxic they are 20 gal a peice i would say i hooked a hose to a power head drained one to about 3/4 full and put my hob's in it now im about to cath the fish then remove big rocks then imm drain down to about an inich above substrate put the furniture sliders on it and slide it to new spot i got a pack of slider in the laundry room thank god for wood floors thans for the advice tm ill let you guys know how it goes

 

[greaver83]

so far so good got all the rocks and plants back in the tank it about 1/4 of the way full will be adding fish soon hope they all live wish me luck

 

[greaver83]

well its done water is pretty cloudy hopefully ll my fish survive the next time i move this will hopefully be in a few years when i get my 150 saltwater setup i dont know if it was more stressful for me or the fish

 

[tmfish]

well its done water is pretty cloudy hopefully ll my fish survive the next time i move this will hopefully be in a few years when i get my 150 saltwater setup i dont know if it was more stressful for me or the fish

Congrats on the move. I'm sure your fish will be fine.