Moving a tank

Phischy

Phischy

New Member
In about a month I'm going to have to move my tank. 40gal w/ 15gal sump. Most of my corals are hardy, shrooms, zoas, colt, xenia. No LPS or anything and just a clown goby, clown fish and some sort of blenny I NEVER see and will finally catch and return to AW. No point in owning and feeding a fish that never comes out of the LR except to eat. Damn thing.

OK, so I'm planning on taking an entire day to move this 1 piece of furniture. What is the best way to do it? My thoughts are to preserve all the tank water into 5 gal buckets and to move LR into it.

In my tank, I had the LR touch the bottom, then put sand around it. When I move it, I may be able to leave some LR in place if I can move everything fast enough, but some corals are attached to that bottom rock, so I may end up disturbing teh sand bed (4 inches).

When I re-aquascape the LR the sand will be disturbed, will this cause the tank to re-cycle? Should I worry about re-introducing corals/fish right away? I will also have the capacity to do a massive H20 change if necessary.

Also, anyone got a ton of 5 gal buckets w/ lids I can borrow for a day? I have 3, plus 5 5gal jugs.

Thanks for any tips.
 
r00onmac

r00onmac

New Member
just a question on top of your post: i know with a 40gal and 15gal sump its prolly necessary, but with a 5.5 gal like i have would i need to do all that? or just move the 1 piece of LR that can fall over and move the tank carefully and replace the 1 piece of LR.... should i lower the water level a little? etc... i wont be moving until may but maybe itll be good to prep myself for the process now lol
 
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Abarnswell

New Member
R0oonmac, I think you shouldn't carry a tank full of water (even a small one). It's too heavy and it will put strain on the glass. You could damage the integrity of the tank.

I'm getting ready to move my 6 gallon tank (I chose a bad spot for it, darn it!). I'm going to siphon the water into large plastic jugs, then carry the empty tank (with sand) to the new spot. I don't have any critters in it yet, and there's not that much sand.
 
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drty811

New Member
when i move any of my stuff i put fresh saltwater in buckets and bring them up to temp. i put all my corals in those buckets and then i put the old water in other buckets. so all i move is sand and tank. after i place my tank i put half old water in and the rest is fresh saltwater. i guess thats about it. never had a problem or had anything die off. good luck to everyone during moving day.
 
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incysor

New Member
Moving the tank with any amount of water, or rock is a no-no.

Just take out everything except the sand.

Have about 50% new water made up, and ready for use.

Move the tank. Use some of the old tank water to rinse off the rock. Re-aquascape. Add your new water, and then as much of the non-rinse-old water as necessary to fill it up.

As long as the sandbed isn't sitting for long periods of time and doesn't get too stirred up there should be little to no spikes.

B
 
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Anonymous

Guest
this is something I do every year (school teacher) This year I moved my 20 instead of my 30 so it was even easier. I set up a 10 with a pump and heater and put everything in there. I carry the empty tank and a couple buckets of the tank water in and then mix up 10 new galons get it all set up and running. bring the rock in the next day and aquascape - critters in the next....... don't know if that will help in your situation. oh yea I run my hot mag to clarify the water as quickly as possible cause the sand will get stired up.
 
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Chubosco

New Member
Glad that was posted. I'm moving in Nov. Just a twelve nano and my greatest fear is not getting the rock back like I have it. I figure lots of freezer bags and starfoam containers. What a pain.
 
djconn

djconn

New Member
A few more tips...

1) Have your newly-made SW ready at the new location so its ready when you get there. You will be tired and shouldn't have to mess with making up SW at this point.
2) Use coolers for coral transport whenever possible and buckets for LR. Coolers will help keep the water temp from rising/falling too much. Put your corals in ziplock baggies and then also add some SW to the cooler in case a bag gets punctured.
3) Have someone help you. Even holding tubing and helping with transport will really save your energy.
4) Take your time and be sure to level your tank before you refill it. :mrgreen:
 
Phischy

Phischy

New Member
I'll be moving it in about 2 weeks. So not looking forward to this! I think when it's re-aquascaped I'll be happier, but I've got some corals expoxied into the rock, which means I've got to break it all off and not kill anything. With my stand and everything else, It'll take 3 trips to move, only 2miles, but it might as well be 100!

On the plus side, it's going to be much more visible and many people will now be able to enjoy it.
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