Upgrading from 55 to 100 gallon tank (steps?)

[Hypen2000]

Ok, so after 1 year of learning (and mistakes), I'm moving up to 100 gallons (48x24x22) with a 30 gallon DIY sump (in a 40 gallon tank).

A few questions:
1. How quickly should I move my fish/coral/LR/etc. over? Should I take more time to cycle the new tank even though the water and some LS&LR are from my old system?
2. Should I move things over in stages? What order?
3. Should I buy more live sand? Old 55 Gal has 3 inches. Was planning to not get more for the new tank and rely mostly on the sump.
4. Any other suggestions/lessons you learned.

Thanks!

Current 55 Gallon setup:
3 wrasses
2 clowns
1 tiny blue tang
1 yellow tang
1 chromis
1 firefish
1 tailspot blenny
2 cleaner shrimp and multiple inverts
Coral (mostly LPS & softies, 3 small SPS)



New Tank:

 

[Oshengems]

Remember that when we are “cycling” our tanks we are just waiting for bacteria to populate the water/surface once populations are balanced Tank is cycled, if you are using the same water/rocks transfer could be right away, two tips I can give you don’t use your old substrate people have had bad results from using the entire batch of the old substrate if you want to seed it take part and toss that on top and of the new substrate and two if you get new rocks use them as base and place your cured stablished rocks on top to since coraline must be covering it already.

Regardless of what you do you tank will do mini cycles just to stabilized it’s self but won’t be as bad as a new cycle where lil to no bacteria is present

 

[Sailingeric]

I went from a 29 gallon to 75 gallon with no issues. Add sand, move over your live rock and add water. Used as much of my water from my old tank as I could to save time on mixing up new water. You should not have a cycle since you are adding new dead stuff. Just don't go adding a lot of new live stock right away. Slow and steady when adding.

 

[Hypen2000]

I went from a 29 gallon to 75 gallon with no issues. Add sand, move over your live rock and add water. Used as much of my water from my old tank as I could to save time on mixing up new water. You should not have a cycle since you are adding new dead stuff. Just don't go adding a lot of new live stock right away. Slow and steady when adding.

Did you move over everything right away? Like the LR, LS, fish, coral, etc. all at once? like in a day and 2? When you say slow and steady, do you mean wait before adding new livestock, or wait to move over you existing?

Since I have a bunch of stuff in my old/current tank, and I only have filtration (overflow box, sump, etc) for 1 system, I would probably have to move everything over all at once. Is that smart? Or should I get a new system running in the new tank first and then slowly bring things over? ]

Thanks!

 

[Hypen2000]

Remember that when we are “cycling” our tanks we are just waiting for bacteria to populate the water/surface once populations are balanced Tank is cycled, if you are using the same water/rocks transfer could be right away, two tips I can give you don’t use your old substrate people have had bad results from using the entire batch of the old substrate if you want to seed it take part and toss that on top and of the new substrate and two if you get new rocks use them as base and place your cured stablished rocks on top to since coraline must be covering it already.

Regardless of what you do you tank will do mini cycles just to stabilized it’s self but won’t be as bad as a new cycle where lil to no bacteria is present

Thanks. When you say part of the old substrate, how much? Half? Do you just throw away the rest of the substrate? Seems like a waste.

Also, why did ppl have bad results with bringing over all their substrate/live sand?

 

[Oshengems]

Thanks. When you say part of the old substrate, how much? Half? Do you just throw away the rest of the substrate? Seems like a waste.

Also, why did ppl have bad results with bringing over all their substrate/live sand?

I believe it has to do with locked nutrients at the bottom part of the sand but I’m not sure to be honest, vacuum the upper layer out to keep and reuse since most of the top sand stays relatively clean since it’s shifted from time to time and the bottom layer make sure you rinse it really good before you use it, you will kill it but at least you know it will be clean and not contaminated with unknowns

 

[Hypen2000]

I believe it has to do with locked nutrients at the bottom part of the sand but I’m not sure to be honest, vacuum the upper layer out to keep and reuse since most of the top sand stays relatively clean since it’s shifted from time to time and the bottom layer make sure you rinse it really good before you use it, you will kill it but at least you know it will be clean and not contaminated with unknowns

That makes sense. Ok, maybe a dumb question, but how do you clean live sand? Is it just rinsing with RO water? Or is there a way to actually kill/sanitize the bacteria in it? Never done this before. thx

 

[Oshengems]

That makes sense. Ok, maybe a dumb question, but how do you clean live sand? Is it just rinsing with RO water? Or is there a way to actually kill/sanitize the bacteria in it? Never done this before. thx

On my build I used 20lb of “live sand” and 60lb of dry sand, the dry sand I did clean it by adding it to a 5g bucket(one bag at a Time was easier) and with a hose rinsed as much as I could until the water was just Much clearer than when I started, it went from milky foamy water to slightly clouded, tossed the dry sand at the bottom and the “live sand” on top, I would say rinse it as much as you can make sure to tumble it rinse and repeat until you feel comfortable that is thoroughly clean.

 

[Sailingeric]

I meant slow on adding new live stock. Dont double the fish the next day after setting it up.

 

[Hypen2000]

So, wash the bottom of the substrate sand the same way you would new live sand? Not sure that would actually kill the harmful bacteria, but I guess, better than nothing.

 

[Hypen2000]

I meant slow on adding new live stock. Dont double the fish the next day after setting it up.

Ok, that makes sense. thx for the clarification.

 

[Burrito]

i recently went from a 30-100g and my process was basically setup the new tank (i had extra equipment so i wasn't dependent on the old tank equipment), new sand, new rock and let it cycle, then moved everything but the sand from the old tank to the new one. saw no ill effects.

old tank sand was cleaned and rinsed saved for another day, and rocks were put into the new tank with existing new rock

the transfer itself took about 30 minutes, the setup beforehand was 2 weeks in the house, and about 8 weeks of rock curing in my garage

 

[Hypen2000]

i recently went from a 30-100g and my process was basically setup the new tank (i had extra equipment so i wasn't dependent on the old tank equipment), new sand, new rock and let it cycle, then moved everything but the sand from the old tank to the new one. saw no ill effects.

old tank sand was cleaned and rinsed saved for another day, and rocks were put into the new tank with existing new rock

the transfer itself took about 30 minutes, the setup beforehand was 2 weeks in the house, and about 8 weeks of rock curing in my garage

Thanks for explaining your process, very helpful. What is the curing process for LV?

 

[Burrito]

i put my rock in a brute can with a heater and pump and let it sit and sit and sit, every 2 weeks i would do 100% water change, basically using my water change water from my 30g, instead of dumping it i saved it for the rocks. it was a pretty short cycle once in the house, i used a bunch of dr tims and some marinepure spheres from my 30g to start the process and dosed ammonia as instructed.

 

[Danj]

I just finished moving everything over from my old 40b to my new Red Sea Peninsula 500 (same dims as your tank more or less). I reused all the old rock and sand, with no ill effects as far as I can tell. To transfer the sand i first got everything else out of the old tank except for the water and sand. Then I scooped all the sand into a 5 gallon bucket. Once the dust settled, I siphoned the water out of the tank into that bucket, stirring the sand as much as possible to effectively rinse all the detritus out of the sand, dumping out the water whenever the bucket filled. Repeated until the tank was emptied, then i put the sand into the new tank. It wasn’t perfectly cleaned by any means, but the tank didn’t really cloud up, there's no detritus laying around except for a little bit in the sump, all the livestock looks happy (fish, anemones, clam, lps, polyps), and I figure I preserved as much of the beneficial bacteria as possible.

For the livestock transfer, I did a drip acclimation to the new tank since it was probably 75% new water.

Good luck!

 

[Hypen2000]

I just finished moving everything over from my old 40b to my new Red Sea Peninsula 500 (same dims as your tank more or less). I reused all the old rock and sand, with no ill effects as far as I can tell. To transfer the sand i first got everything else out of the old tank except for the water and sand. Then I scooped all the sand into a 5 gallon bucket. Once the dust settled, I siphoned the water out of the tank into that bucket, stirring the sand as much as possible to effectively rinse all the detritus out of the sand, dumping out the water whenever the bucket filled. Repeated until the tank was emptied, then i put the sand into the new tank. It wasn’t perfectly cleaned by any means, but the tank didn’t really cloud up, there's no detritus laying around except for a little bit in the sump, all the livestock looks happy (fish, anemones, clam, lps, polyps), and I figure I preserved as much of the beneficial bacteria as possible.

For the livestock transfer, I did a drip acclimation to the new tank since it was probably 75% new water.

Good luck!

Thanks Danj! I think I will do it the way you did. I'm waiting to finish building my sump and then I will move everything over. Would love to see your current tank if you have pictures!

 

[Danj]

Just to clarify, when stirring the sand I just used the end of the siphon hose and overall that worked really well. All credit goes to BRS for that tip [emoji106]

As for your question in the original post, whether to move things gradually or not, I basically got as much as possible functional on the new tank first. Made sure the water parameters we're good, temperature good, etc. Then on "moving day" I moved all the livestock, sand, etc, along with any of the equipment that I was transferring over (Apex, skimmer, lights, etc). The idea was to keep the old tank as stable as possible until acclimating them to the new system, and then ensuring that system was fully functional (for critical systems anyway) as quickly as possible.

And yeah, one of these days I'll get around to a build thread. For now all my reefing time is dedicated to finishing the mixing station, and the odds and ends of the tank itself. If I try to sneak any more reefing time into the mix, my wife may finally have the justification she needs to kill me [emoji51].

Have fun with the sump! Good times, good times.

 

[Dburr1014]

+1 on not having problems with using old sand.
What I did was take out rocks and coral and put that in buckets.
If your sand is relatively clean, scoop it out and dump in the new tank. If it's not clean, do a water change on the old tank and dig into your sand to clean it.
Add sand to new tank.
Hint :cover your sand with saran wrap after it's in the new tank. Add some water, maybe half. Take out the saran wrap, slowly. (wow, no cloudy tank) add rocks, fish and rest of old water. Top off with your new water.
Mini - cycle? A day at most but with the fresh water and and cloud free tank, fish will be fine.
Good luck

 

[Hypen2000]

+1 on not having problems with using old sand.
What I did was take out rocks and coral and put that in buckets.
If your sand is relatively clean, scoop it out and dump in the new tank. If it's not clean, do a water change on the old tank and dig into your sand to clean it.
Add sand to new tank.
Hint :cover your sand with saran wrap after it's in the new tank. Add some water, maybe half. Take out the saran wrap, slowly. (wow, no cloudy tank) add rocks, fish and rest of old water. Top off with your new water.
Mini - cycle? A day at most but with the fresh water and and cloud free tank, fish will be fine.
Good luck

wow, never heard the saran wrap idea but i'll try it! thanks!