Amount of sand

[crooper]

I ventured to a LFS (Saltwater City in Bellevue, WA) this weekend and the salesman told me that very little (like 1/4 to 1/2 inch) is the most sand you should put in a tank, if any at all. Is this right? I was under the impression that 1" was a good amount.
He also said that bioballs aren't a very good filtration method and that I should get rid of them and just use live rock and replace my air charged protein skimmer with a better one. I don't intend to fully upgrade my entire tank filtration system. At least not right now.

 

[thomas712]

All of that is a matter of opinion.
Many folks use a SSB=shallow sandbed, normally of about 2 inches or enough to just bring the level up to the plastic frame at the bottom of the tank. This normally brings the viewing level of the sandbed up so that you can see what is happening to it, and the life that is within it.
Some folks like the DSB and its denitrating capabilities and or the room it gives burrowing fish to play, or for sand dwelling anemones to place their foot into.
Some (like me) have a SSB in the main tank and a DSB in their refugium. This makes the DSB a remote DSB, one that can be controlled if there is a problem with it.
Bio balls have been given a bad rap. It seems certain Villagers have gotten their torches and pitchforks out and say that bio balls harbor or create nitrates. Not really true. It is always up to the aquarist to have a method of nitrate removal, whether from water changes, DSB, denitrator, refugium what ever the case may be. Its all a matter of maintaining them and cleaning them once in a while to keep detritus from building up on them and causing those nitrates to develop. Many folks can be lazy when it comes to that and they blame it on the bio balls. I used them for several years but removed them when I setup a fairly large refugium with DSB, macro algea and rock. Like NMReef I like to call it a supplemental filtration tank.
What protein skimmer do you have right now?
Thomas

 

[crooper]

My tank is a 100 gallon acrylic built into the wall between my living room and a bedroom in my house. It was constructed by the previous owner, and I'm in the process of rejuvenating it. It's been a fish-only, dead rock and sand, pretty darn boring to look at. I want to change that, but not break the bank. Well not all at once anyway. It's got large grain gravel and dead rock. My plans include sand, live rock, invert cleaning crew, and fish. Down the road I might improve my lighting and get some corals. One step at a time.
I honestly don't know the brand of protein skimmer. It's about 2.5 feet long, 6" in diameter, and is air-driven. Since my air pump died I bought a TetraTec DW96 and hooked it up the wood air "stone". I think I'm going tos splice the airline and add a second wood "stone" to create more bubbles. That's about as far as I want to go on upgrades. I also have a sump with bioballs and bought a Quiet One 4000 to replace my old water pump (which died at the same time as the air pump). The single pump runs both the skimmer and sump return.
How do you clean the bioballs? How often?
Thomas thanks for all your help on this and so many other topics.

 

[thomas712]

Ok~ Definatly remove all that large gravel, no need for that.
Hmm. 5 gallon bucket is about 40-50 pounds of sand dry I'm guessing. I'd think about getting another bucket or two or 80 pounds more, just to be safe. If you can find dry sand fine, as long as its aragonite. This should give you approx a 2 inch sandbed. If there has been dead rock in it then think again, if it has been there a long time then I'm sure that it is alive with bacteria at the least, and if there were any live rock at all it could very well have critter life as well. Perhaps only you would know.
Sounds like you may very well wish to have a better skimmer somewhere down the road.
All you need to do to clean bio balls is to remove about 1/4 of them and rinse then really well in your old tank water from a water change. Your choice, you can do that every time you do a water change or whenever you see any type of buildup on them.
Thomas