cc to sand...help!

[juniorzc123]

well im not really new...I have had my tank running for 2 years and the crushed coral i have is driving my crazy... the lfs recommended it and i have regreted it since... it started as a fowlr and now im slowly converting to reef... how hard would it be to convert the cc to sand? what are the problems i will run into as far as fish and coral health... i only have shrooms, zoos, and a few leathers... its a 75 gallon tank.. how much sand would you reccomend and should i do all live sand or a mix? thanks, Zach

 

[imurnamine]

I would hate to have to remove all of it, maybe you can remove a fair bit of it and then mix it up with live sand... Maybe you should get at least 50 lbs...?

 

[garnet13aj]

Mixing cc and sand isn't a good idea. It will eventually sift into layers and detritus will get caught in the cracks.
I switched mine over a few months ago and I haven't regretted it. It wasn't nearly as hard as people made it out to be either. What I did was take all the LR and put it in 5 gallon buckets and filled them up with water. Then I added all the critters to the bucket so all that was left in the tank was cc and about half the 2/3 of the water. (I have a 55 btw). Then I got a trash back and a large yogurt container and started scooping it into the trash back that my roomate was holding open for me. I was done scooping in about 1/2 hour and then I placed the rocks back in. Next I poured the sand around the rocks. Let it settle for a few hours and put all my critters and fish back in. It was still a little cloudy, but it worked out fine.
Hope that helped you more than it confused you, I swear it doens't have to be as hard as people make it seem.

 

[thud]

Originally Posted by ImUrNamine
I would hate to have to remove all of it, maybe you can remove a fair bit of it and then mix it up with live sand... Maybe you should get at least 50 lbs...?
Adding live sand to his/her 2 year established tank might raise her ammonia and put her/him in "cycling mode."
I would sifin out SOME of the crushed coral and put in some non-live sand.
You can add live sand if it's cured though...

 

[juniorzc123]

Yeah the crushed coral keeps giving me small nitrate spikes which screws everything up... and the color isnt as nice as sand... so i would really like to get rid of all of it. i am worried to add just live sand.. like u said it would cause and ammonia spike... not real sure what to do... takeing all the fish and inverts out and leaving them in a abucket for a few hours doesnt sound like a bad idea... i have about 90 lbs of live rock that i would have to take out too... would the live rock be enough to keep everything going if i just used regular sand?

 

[garnet13aj]

I would think so, the tank is obviously established after 2 years.

 

[juniorzc123]

still looking for more opinions on if it will work or not... hoping i can pull it off with very little die off... should i use live sand or just go cheap and get sand...??