Help me plan for success on this reboot

[Jl330]

I have a 75 gallon that crashed. Since then I've been having issues with algae and aiptasia. Rather than try to keep fighting, I'm just going to reboot and start over.

I'll move my fish and the handful of still living corals to a 20 gallon until the new setup has cucked. I'll be draining the tank, removing the sand and drying out all the rocks and equipment.

Upon reboot, I'd like to optimize the equipment o have and hopefully be setup for success.

Here's what I have available
75 gallon drilled tank
29 gallon sump that I'm not happy with and will be rebuilding.
Jebao 4 pump doser
Jebao gyre pump
Reef octopus hob skimmer that may or may not be replaced with an in tank one, either way I'm moving it to the sump.
Smart ato micro
1 generic media reactor


From here, I want this to be low maintenance and less stressful. I'm constantly battling the current tank and I just want to start over.

 

[cvrle1]

When you say "drying out all the rocks" do you plan on giving them a bleach or/and acid bath, or just literally leave them out to dry and nothing else? If it is latter, it may not do much, unles you leave them out for months and months.

 

[Jl330]

When you say "drying out all the rocks" do you plan on giving them a bleach or/and acid bath, or just literally leave them out to dry and nothing else? If it is latter, it may not do much, unles you leave them out for months and months.

I can do either. Was going to leave them in the sun for a few weeks but I can do bleach/acid bat. Not sure what acid to use.

 

[cvrle1]

If you never worked with muriatic acid, I would strongly suggest you use bleach method. Muriatic acid can be quite dangerous and things can go south really fast. Acid also takes away some of your rock, so you end up losing like 10% of it, or something like that.

For bleach, dump all the rocks into a bucket, pour a mixture of bleach (regular unscented, plain jane bleach like Clorox) and water and let it be. 10/1 mixture of water to bleach should be good enough, but it is all personal preference. Some people will leave rocks in for few days, some will do week (I did week) You dont need heater or water pumps, but again some will use pumps to move water around. Then take out, rinse well and either leave in the sun to bake for a week to get all the bleach to disappear, or put back into bucket with fresh water and use dechlorinator. Leave again for few days. Final step, put into bucket with RODI water, leave for few days, and then test for PO4 to make sure rock isnt leaching phosphates.

If you search "bleach rock" you will get lots of threads with plenty of info and ideas on different methods people use and what to look out for.

Good video to watch in general about all this

 

[R.Weller]

While your rock is bleaching as noted above, any thoughts or plans to work an algae scrubber into your next build? It takes time, but it is possible to 'grow' nutrients out of your system using this method. There are several options based on the space you have available around your sump.

 

[Jl330]

While your rock is bleaching as noted above, any thoughts or plans to work an algae scrubber into your next build? It takes time, but it is possible to 'grow' nutrients out of your system using this method. There are several options based on the space you have available around your sump.

Absolutely. I forgot that I have a makeshift one assembled but I plan to make a batter one if i don't go fuge