I am thinking about purchasing a 55 reef that has been setup for 2 years. It would take me a hour and a half to get the tank to my house plus the time to tear down the tank and put it back together. I have 2 32gal trash cans, 20gal rubbermaid, 15gal rubbermaid, and a 45gal rubbermaid container. The outside air temp will be approx 50F @ the time of the move. How should I go about this. The tank has about 70 pounds of LR, DSB, about 20-30 corals, a few fish, cleanup crew, ect. Any info you can give me would be greatly appreciated.
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Scott
"Life is either a daring adventure or nothing at all" reef@pacifier.com
"Work like you don't need the money,
Love like you have never been hurt,
And dance like no one is watching"
Have fun, when we moved our 100 gallon about 5 miles and it was not fun. You will want to seperate the "good stuff" from the rest so go to Target and buy about 2-3 20 gallon totes for the rock and fish and corals, get a lot of friends and hopefully be able to move the tank with just the sand in the bottom. A covered truck or van would be the best to help keep everything warm. You will want to keep as much of the old water as possible and have plenty of new water ready. I hope this helps.
Jonathan
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"If we weren't all crazy we would all go insane" Jimmy Buffett
Hehehe; have I seen a pic of this tank Scott? If it's the one that's been advertised at Woody's that's a pretty good deal and I know the guy has taken good care of it.
BTW; if you guys were thinking of heading down this weekend, don't wait until Sunday. Inventory is going fast with the sale going on.
I wish I can make it down sooner I don't even know if I'll have time on sunday
Hey Dennis are you the one that was looking for the green star polyps? If so they are starting to cover the rock nicley and I hope to cut the rock out in a week or two.
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Scott
"Life is either a daring adventure or nothing at all" reef@pacifier.com
"Work like you don't need the money,
Love like you have never been hurt,
And dance like no one is watching"
Scott,
Remember to siphon off some good water into your containers BEFORE you move any of the rocks around. Once you get the good clean water in the trashcans and containers start putting the corals in the containers. With 70lbs of rock I would split the rock between the 32 gallon trash cans. One of the hardest things to deal with is going to be your clean up crew as they are going to be on the glass, rocks, sand, etc... and it will be some work to get them without crushing them by accident when stacking the rock in the garbage cans. Think of them as $1 bills and it makes collecting them a little easier though!
I like the 32 gallon trash cans cause they are cheap and if you fill them with about 20 gallons of water they are still moveable with 2 guys and don't splash around to much.
When moving the corals you might want to bag some of the larger ones to keep them from stinging each other as opposed to just placing them in a container together.
If you have some extra aquarium heaters they will be needed, hopefully some of the kind with the plastic around them so they are less likely to break. An enclosed vehicle would be good for the corals and fish, like keep them inside a car with the heater going in the car and put the rock in the bed of a pickup with the tank and you should be okay.
My first tank was a 120 that I moved 100 miles in the middle of the summer, and I moved it in the middle of the night to avoid the temperature problems, and it might help you if you planned to do the move at least in the peak temperature of the day. Maybe check the forecast to try to pick a particularly warm day.
Good Luck!
Nathan
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Always get a 2nd opinion (at least until someone tells you what you want to hear!)
Visit my weak homepage at www.padens.homepage.com
Excellent suggestions Nathan; planning is definitely key. Sounds like you planned your move very well
Good for you Scott! That's a nice set up and a sweet deal.
One thing I might suggest is to have *extra* water warmed up and ready to add at home, just in case. And have extra buckets handy. You can never have too many buckets and you can never tell when someone might tip buckets over, full of pre-mixed saltwater. Not that I've ever done that, you understand
Gloves! Don't forget gloves; no use tearing your hands up or getting anymore bristle worm stings than necessary.
I could help you pack up if you need an extra pair of hands on this end. I don't have a lot of extra time on the weekends to spend on the travel time but I could help with that much, anyway.
Thanks everyone for your suggestions. My wife gave me the OK
Please keep the ideas coming. I'm going to start making a detailed plan and hopefully everything goes good.
Alice, I just might hit you up on the offer
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Scott
"Life is either a daring adventure or nothing at all" reef@pacifier.com
"Work like you don't need the money,
Love like you have never been hurt,
And dance like no one is watching"
Another good way to transport fish and corals is to place them in clean igloo or coleman coolers. They keep the temperature stable during the trip and save you from stressing out about the outside temperatures.
Good luck moving the tank. My wife and I will be moving our 90 and 30 gallon reefs about 3 hours away this spring. It is going to be quite a chore, but with proper planning it can be done with a minimum of losses.
Good luck,
Andrew
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