Advice on tank transfer procedures?

[TriggersAmuck]

As far as transfers go, I'm doing about a simple of one as can be in moving a 14 gallon cube to a 20 gallon cube with all of the equipment, livestock and rock being lifted and shifted. This is a bare bottom tank, so the only potential bacteria loss might be what is on the bottom plexiglass protection sheet that will be sold off with the smaller/older tank.

So my question is for those that have transferred from one tank to another, in the same house, into the very same location (nothing as simple as setting up in a different location I'm afraid), do you have any lessons learned or tricks you thought of to minimize environmental changes and the amount of time that any livestock is in temporary bins? My inhabitants are used to large water changes (80% weekly), but that change is still introduced (somewhat) gradually. It will be harder to accomplish this knowing all of the original water has to be removed to multiple bins (to allow removal of anemone laden rock without stacking on top of each other).

Some of my thoughts:
1. Bring the house temperature up to be closer to tank temp a few hours before transfer time (since I don't want to risk putting either powerhead or heaters into holding bins with fishes and anemones that can stray into them).
2. Photograph rock positions ahead of time since the fit will still be a tight one.
3. Turn off lights a good hour ahead of time to force corals and 'nems to close up, making it easier to remove them from bottom surface.
4. Be ready to anchor plexiglass with one smaller rock to prevent it floating after removing all other rock (since it all has to come out before catching these wee tiny fish).
5. Have some bottled bacteria on hand as a proactive backup.
6. Acclimate fish and 'nems to newer chemistry in the temporary holding bins before pumping that water into the new tank. (Allows a more gradual transition).
7. Leak test the new tank days ahead to avoid unpleasant transfer day discoveries. (Ditto regards the stand's stability, given it is a prefab).

 

[Fish Think Pink]

As far as transfers go, I'm doing about a simple of one as can be in moving a 14 gallon cube to a 20 gallon cube with all of the equipment, livestock and rock being lifted and shifted. This is a bare bottom tank, so the only potential bacteria loss might be what is on the bottom plexiglass protection sheet that will be sold off with the smaller/older tank.

So my question is for those that have transferred from one tank to another, in the same house, into the very same location (nothing as simple as setting up in a different location I'm afraid), do you have any lessons learned or tricks you thought of to minimize environmental changes and the amount of time that any livestock is in temporary bins? My inhabitants are used to large water changes (80% weekly), but that change is still introduced (somewhat) gradually. It will be harder to accomplish this knowing all of the original water has to be removed to multiple bins (to protect allow removal of anemone laden rock without stacking on top of each other).

Are you thinking move will take all day? If so recommend airstones and heaters - you can get splitters to divert air to multiple airstones for all your bins. However, even with complexities of multiple bins to keep from squishing anemones, think you can be fast enough to avoid airstones & heaters given you are going from a 14g.