Help w/ Tank Transfer.....

[nbd13]

Ok guys i have about 2 months till the transfer, but want to plan it out to lessen the chance of losing any Livestock. They key to this move is to NOT loose any livestock! So heres my idea,

It has to happen in 1 day.

The new 275 is going in a different spot that the 180 so that should help...

But i am still nervous...

I plan on doing this,

The night before i will take the canopy off my 180, get the lights in the new canopy for the 275 (using the same lights on the 275 as the old 180)...

So the day of the move.

I will shut everything off (all the pumps) and move the coral to the 70 gallon sump on the 180. I will fill the 70 gallon sump up all the way. throw some fans over it and a heater or 2 and connnect it to the medusa dual controller.

Then i will drain the water down and move the LR to the bins with the tank water in it. Then i will catch the fish and put them in the 70 gallon sump with some egg crate over it...

Then i will take the rocks and aquascape the new tank, i will spray the LR with some salt water every 20 mintues or so (got this idea from Acro over at RC when he did his move). i plan on this taking about 1-2 hours... Acro did this for 3 hours and never had a diatom bloom or anything.

Then i will start putting water in the tank. I will have the new sump filled with NEW water ready to go and then put the fish in and coral in and fire it up....

Now the week before i will make up about 250 gallons of new water and let it get conditioned very well. That way i will have extra on hand just in case and plus with letting it get contioned i will hope to lessen the chance of the live stock being stressed...

Anyway my total volume right now is about 243 and my new volume will be about 375 so i will need about 150 gallons on new water...

So its like a 50% water change...

Anyway what do you think?

i will also fill the new tank up with RO water and let it run to make sure i have no leaks before hand...

thanks

Nick

[invincible569]

Nick not sure if this would help you.. but I saved Steve Weasts directions A LONG time ago when he transferred his 500g to his 850g. Hopefully Steve wouldnt mind posting this up:

Invincible.....

one month before the move....build light hood and do as much construction on the stand addition as possible without affecting the existing tank's operation.

Two weeks before the move....... generate 1000gals of RO water.

5 days before the move.. mix RO water with salt.....heat/circulate

Moving day...Sat 8am...start draining the old tank's water into 2 empty pools. Move the corals and fish into one pool and the rock into the other.

Sat 10am...With the corals and rock now in the pools, completely drained and sponged out the old tank. Tank and its light hood were taken down.

Sat noon... Began to finish the carpentry work to integrate the new portion of the stand with the old portion of the stand. This took some time because I had to remove the old stand's decking, add new floor joist, and then re-deck the top with 7/8" tongue & groove plywood. This was done to make the stand addition as if it were one piece and not just a scab on situation.

Sat 6pm.... lifted new tank into place. Lifted new light hood into place.

Sat 8pm.....drilled all holes in the tank nesessary for the plumbing and started to re-connect all the plumbing....overflows, closed loop, and sump returns.

Sun 1am... plumbing no where near finished yet...go to bed

Sun 8am..... continue the plumbing

Sun 5pm.... plumbing now finally finished. Start to refill tank with new water that has been recirculating for almost a week now.

Sun 6pm..... with the tank now full, start pumps and check out system.

Sun 7pm....no leaks. Start putting rocks back in. I'm getting tired, so, just a rough aquascaping is performed.

Sun midnight... all rock/fish/corals are in the new tank and all systems are operatioal

Next 5 days....aquascape. There was no ammonia spike detected. I lost 5 corals in the process.

[wasp]

Sounds pretty good, you did not mention if you have sand, I assume it must be BB?

[nbd13]

Yeah its BB with starboard i think a nice off white color too...

Anyway i read that Edward it helped, but did he add any of the old water into the new tank?

i figure i will need about 100 gallons of water to make the new tank operational. so about 50% water change.

i really hope i do not loose any coral.

Nick

[invincible569]

Nick, im not too sure if he used the old water or not.

I would also make more water just in case. You would rather have MORE than less and cant operate your tank like you want.

[wasp]

I did a tank transfer maybe year and half ago, from a small DSB, to a BB system around 3 x the size of the old one.
I did use the old water, syphoned it out of the old tank to as close as I could get to the sand without sucking any crud, and used it all in the new tank, so probably new tank had around 25% old water. Just transfered rocks and livestock straight across, all was sweet, no ammonia spike or losses.

[nbd13]

Great the only thing is i need to transfer the live stock to bins....

becasue i want to aqauscape it with no fish in there or water so i can use a drill and use some zpis ties...

so the fish and coral will go into my 70 gallon sump for 1-2 hours then trasnfer everything over...

i hope it will work for me..

thanks!

Nick

[nbd13]

i am making about 300 gallons thats way more than i think i will need too...

thanks for the tips everyone, anyone else?

thanks!

Nick

[gqjeff]

Just make sure temp and salinity are the same.. Also aireate or put some pumps in the bins to move water over the corals and heaters to maintain the temp..

Jeff

[nyfireman3097]

i went from 55 to a 125 and had no loses besides a starfish and a kole tang buut all corals and other inverts did fine
Nick

[nbd13]

Why do you think you lost the kole tang Nick?

i am going to have heaters and fans over the 70 gallon tank on a medsua dual controller, also will throw some maxijets in there to move water around....

thanks guys!

Nick

[nyfireman3097]

I lost it due to my heater getting unplugged and i didnt realize it
Nick

[nbd13]

oh ok, sorry to hear about that.

thanks for the help guys!

Nick