Cali Kid Corals

Need moving advice/tubs etc.

johara

johara

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It appears to be time to rip out the living room carpet and put down laminate. All good, except for the 155 Gallon bowfront on the carpet :( . I bought the tank used about 6 years ago, I think he had had it for at least 5 years before that. So I'm thinking though it would probably be just fine, I'd sleep better replacing it rather than moving it twice more - once out of the LR and again back in again. I'm assuming re-doing the floor and painting will take at least a week to be complete, so my corals and fish need to live somewhere else for that week.

Options seem to include setting up a new tank and stand in the family room, moving all tank contents in to it, then when LR is done, everything out of new tank and into tubs, move new tank into LR, and everything from tubs into new tank again. Or...try to keep everything alive in tubs for the week it takes to re-do LR floors, and only have to set up new tank once. What do you all think?

This tank is jam packed with grown together coral, rock etc. - I am NOT looking forward to this! I tried to sell the family on leaving it there and putting the floor in around it, but this doesn't appear to be an acceptable option.

Does anyone have experience and advice for this kind of move? Any one have large tubs, extra heaters, pumps etc. they could lend me?
 
Hi Johara, do you have an estimated date? I have some stuff you could use, trash cans, stock tub, jugs. Keeping fish and corals alive in a stock tub for extended periods is certainly a challenge, especially in your case since everything is acclimated to a particular orientation to light and flow. I would not be looking froward to it myself having seen your tank.

I'd say even though it will be a complete PITA the setup in the family room is a decent option the second move shouldn't be too much of a challenge since everything will be plumbed and setup already, it will just be a matter of breaking down minimally and sliding everything over into the adjacent room.
 
How much rock/coral is in the tank? Have some strong bodies?

What MIGHT be the easiest solution is to drain most the water, and try to carry it to a new place, and refill. Having done something similar with my 135g just me and my pops I can tell you that it is a heavy SOB type of job, but doable (as I'm not exactly a strong guy :D). You might need to remove some rocks, but at least you don't need to redo the entire aquascape (although I find that strangely fun to do :D).
 
sfsuphysics said:
How much rock/coral is in the tank? Have some strong bodies?

What MIGHT be the easiest solution is to drain most the water, and try to carry it to a new place, and refill. Having done something similar with my 135g just me and my pops I can tell you that it is a heavy SOB type of job, but doable (as I'm not exactly a strong guy :D). You might need to remove some rocks, but at least you don't need to redo the entire aquascape (although I find that strangely fun to do :D).
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+1 on that. I once did that and used a moving dolly.
I just rolled it around until the work was done and then rolled it back.
Of course you need to take out as much water as possible to lift it on the dolly or dollies but you can just put the water right back in after you roll it to the next room. :)
 
I have not broken one yet but I think I'm one of the luckiest guys on earth IMO. :)
I also agree with Gresham,Bryan and Jeremy.
Come to think of it, almost all the rock was out of the tanks when I moved them.
I put them in 5 gallon buckets and trash cans along with water.
 
Whoops - I thought I'd get email notification if there were replies - truly didn't mean to ignore y'all!

I don't have an estimated date for the move yet - I guess it depends on when I work up the courage to dismantle the tank - but likely sometime in the next month. I agree with the majority that trying to move the tank with anything in it would be more risk than I'm willing to take. So I appreciate the offers of moving equipment, and Jim's offer of "board and care". I'm leaning toward plan A - setting up a new tank in a different room, moving in to that, and then when all the flooring/painting is done, hopefully I can do a one day move of the new tank back in to the living room again. I've got a two strong grown kids to hit up for moving help - but may need to put out a food, beer and frags enticement for more help!

So now is the only fun part of this - planning a new setup! I've pretty much decided to ditch the sand bed, I feel lucky to have had it work well for 8 years now (silica sand btw), but I plan to go shallow bed in the new tank. I'm also planning to get rid of a fair amount of rock, and leave much more swimming space for a cleaner look - I'm a little tired of my overgrown jungle. For the tank, I want to stick to more or less the same footprint, but that could mean a 155 or 175 bow, or 180 or 220 standard. The bow gets lots of attention - but I really want the tank inhabitants to be the attraction, not the "cage", so I was leaning toward a standard tank. Then I scoped out the selection at Aquarium Concepts and there's a 175 bow with stand and canopy at a reasonably good price on sale - just not a color I really like.

Has any body seen any good tank and stand setups on sale at any of the lfs? Where would you look for a new tank and stand in our area? How about aragonite sand? Any lfs with good deals or does everyone go on line? Salt? I usually go online but wouldn't mind supporting local places if the price was reasonable.

And one last question for anyone who is still reading - if I remove the dsb and 30-50% of the live rock, am I in for a major cycle? I can test frequently and be ready for water changes, but don't want to kill off my fish - some of whom are more than 10 years old with me!
 
johara where you located? I have a 300g rubbermaid stock tank you could borrow and hold everything in another room of the house until the floor is done. I keep it on hand just incase I have a tank crack, etc. Let me know. I am just over in San Ramon.
 
johara said:
Has any body seen any good tank and stand setups on sale at any of the lfs? Where would you look for a new tank and stand in our area? How about aragonite sand? Any lfs with good deals or does everyone go on line? Salt? I usually go online but wouldn't mind supporting local places if the price was reasonable.

And one last question for anyone who is still reading - if I remove the dsb and 30-50% of the live rock, am I in for a major cycle? I can test frequently and be ready for water changes, but don't want to kill off my fish - some of whom are more than 10 years old with me!
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Most stores sell setups as loss leaders, you're good there as far as pricing, I wouldn't worry about going online, personally I'd shy away from bow fronts, but that's MO.

A good place to get sand through is one that orders from Aquatic Rocks, Doug's sand is very clean and rarely requires rinsing, it's cheap too ~40 for 50lbs. Also, salt is sold as a loss leader at many stores, so look around.

I don't think your in for a major cycle if you move everything, just be careful not to transfer mung to your holding tank, get a skimmer in there and suspend feeding, in fact you may not want to feed your fish for a few days before the move to clean them out. Do be ready to do water changes though. I need to have a tank repaired within the next couple of weeks, its a 6'X3'X3' monster, if I'm not too haggard I'll document it and you can see what to do and what not to do (hopefully more of the prior than the latter :D)
 
Chicken - Your offer of the large tub sounds like it could be very helpful! What size vehicle would I need to pick it up?
And thanks Eileen for the offer to help move! I may end up needing help doing the plumbing - I've actually never set up a tank/sump etc. from scratch as my current system was bought used already all hooked up. I'll be doing lots of reading on reef central! Still no start date though, I'll be in touch.
 
Johara,

Start fragging now and be sure to spread around frags of anything you care about, just in case. I still have your frogspawn if you need a mini colony back. ;)
 
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