Rinsing aragonite substrate...

[JraGold]

I'm in the process of setting up my first sw tank! Yay me! I have used crushed coral in the past for african cichlid setups and that stuff is a pain to clean. .. just wondering wondering how others rinse the aragonite and if there's anything different I need to do rather than using straight tap water?

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[Sniperhank]

We usually say skip the crushed coral for that very reason. A simple aragonite sandbed will be fine. Some even use pool filter sand with success. But you don't disturb the sandbed in saltwater, you set it and forget it.
In terms of water, you want to use ro/di water rather than tap. Nitrates/phosphates can easily get out of control from tap. Personally, my ro/di has been down for almost 2 years and I have been using distilled water you can get at Walmart or other stores with success. Is there algae in my tank? Yes. Is it controllable? Yes.

 

[JraGold]

Oh I'm sorry! I forgot to mention that I bought the caribsea aragonite to use in the sw setup. Not using crushed coral. Use rodi water to rinse the aragonite? I have a rodi system so that's no problem just sounds kind of like a waste. Just trying to rinse the dust off it, or should I just filter out what dust doesn't settle after the fact?

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[Sniperhank]

Just give it a mighty good rinse and things will be just fine. I used old tank water the last time I rinsed sand, if that helps.

 

[BLUElobster99]

I use the same substrate and I had to rinse it a million times. But I'd rather spend time rinsing then have to stare at a cloudy tank.

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[mr_X]

I put it in a bucket (probably about 5" or so of sand) and then run tap water in the bucket as I stir with my hand, then dump the white water trying not to lose the sand, then repeat, then dump, then repeat.....a zillion times until the water is mostly clear.

 

[chefbill]

old clean pillow case and a garden hose, a touch of prime if paranoid.

 

[JraGold]

Ok great! Thanks for the advice! Will hopefully be getting to it this weekend!

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