Use old water on conversion to BB?

[panic]

Do I use the water from my current setup when I convert?

I have a 75 setup right now with all of my corals. My new 180 is totally filled with new water and my new rock, and an empty 100gal rubbermaid for a sump. The ph is stuck at 7.8 with no lights or reactor. All of my reactors, lights, etc are on the old system. Let me know if I should do it like this to blend the new and old:

- drain all of the old water into the new sump.
- add the corals and livestock to the sump
- let the new water from the tank circulate into the sump with the corals
- move the the corals fish and cleaners to the tank
- skimmer
- Calcium reactor
- heater
- chiller
- lights
- uv
- the rest

Here's a progress shot since everyone likes a pic

[Weatherman]

I, generally, don’t recommend using any old water when setting up a new tank. No need to drag along old, nutrient-rich water into a clean new environment.

Just acclimate your animals to the new tank as if you were bringing them home from the lfs for the first time. You don’t even have to do the transfer all at once. It took me about three weeks to transfer all my animals from my 180 to my 120 when I first set the 120 up.

BTW, a 7.8 pH is kind of low. Could be from high indoor CO2 levels. What’s your alkalinity running at?

[panic]

that's the problem. Everything I use to maintain proper levels is on my old setup keeping it in check. The levels of the new water is straight out of the salt bucket - water change levels. If I take everything off of the old setup early to condition the new water, I run the risk of killing all of my livestock. 200 gallons in the old system (75 display, 2x 50 gal packed Rubbermaid prop tanks, 100 gal sump), -and- 380 gallons in the new system including all of the satellite components.

[Weatherman]

If that's the case, then it sounds like your plan of moving the animals and old tank water into the new sump and then slowly mixing in water from the new tank is a good one.

I'm still a bit concerned about the low pH. It should be somewhere around 8.2-8.3.

[panic]

I agree with you on the ph. I think it will go up a little when I get some halides on it. What else? Buffer is just a quick fix, I guess I could use an A/B additive.

[Weatherman]

Alkalinity? Calcium?

It’s important to know where those two are.

[panic]

Originally Posted by Weatherman

Alkalinity? Calcium?

It’s important to know where those two are.

Yep - I'll post the results when I get home today. Ph was 7.84 5:15am this morning, temp. 79.4. (I love my ReefKeeper II by the way, I wish it measured alk and Ca.)

I used Oceanic (high Ca) and don't have the coral load in this new tank yet to use up the calcium and process Co2, so this might be the culprit for low alk and high co2 - no bubbles from the skimmer or drain to sump yet that can help let co2 escape. I'll do the bubble test when I get home also.

My guess is that Alk is 1.5 meq/l and Ca is about 575