crushed coral to live sand

[aquavegas]

I am currently converting my 55 gal tank to live sand i have crushed coral as of now i would have done live sand in the beginning but the dude told me at the lfs that live sand is not necessary, he also told he a 50/50 40 watt bulb would work just fine what a joke so now i just got 60 lbs of live sand off e-bay which i hope doest back fire if you want to search it look up LIVE SAND 20 lb.bag aquarium reef saltwater NO RESERVE on e-bay
but i need to know the best way of cycling the sand and transferring it to my tank i have like 5 fish 40 lbs of live rock some stripped mushrooms 2 anemones and yellow polyps i dont want to do any damage help!

 

[zacg]

i done the same thing to my 24 gallon i have crushed coral and wanted to switch to live sand and i done it will all my corals and fish still in the water. the best way i found to do it was to divide the tank into 4ths and i done a corner at a time i would wash enough live sand to cover the 4th i was replacing and i would scoop out my crushed coral for that corner and then put the sand back down. and then wait a week and check ur stats and if they are ok do another corner and do that each week till you have it replaced. that is the routine i followed and i didn't lose one thing. so you can try it thats what worked for me.

 

[aquavegas]

should i cycle it through a filter first so i can get all the excess stuff out of the water and make sure my ammonia doest spike

 

[zacg]

i didnt but i dont know with urs being a 55 instead of a 24

 

[aquavegas]

anyone else

 

[spanko]

IMO do not use live sand. Use dry. Make sure you rinse it well to get the dust out.

 

[aquavegas]

i already purchased 60lbs what is dry sand and why is that better

 

[salt life]

Originally Posted by Aquavegas
http:///forum/post/3071213
i already purchased 60lbs what is dry sand and why is that better
dry sand is just the stuff in the live sand bags dried out and packaged dry with no water. it is better because with the bagged live sand, it isn't really bagged. you don't really know how long it has been bagged and the water in the bag has spoiled, when you put that in your tank your gonna get a cycle and a big ammonia spike. dry sand is cheaper too. I got a couple 20# bags for 15 bucks each.

 

[aquavegas]

i planned on cycling it first with a filter in a separate bucket so i would not have an ammonia spike and doing it the 3rds
anyone else ??

 

[outsdr2]

Well I believe that with your particular scenario dry would have been the logical choice given you already had live rock it would have seeded the dry sand. I have extra live sand left over from another tank setup and would also like to convert from crushed coral. I am thinking of leaving the coral and just topping it off with the cycled live sand. I have a 30 gallon bin I will cycle it in. any transfer tips? also my sand has expiration dates on them.