How do you change your water?

[larryndana]

Great thread, I'm enjoying everyones tricks.
Lubeck, no fuge yet. I'm just starting out and into it over a month now. I just have a Aquapod 24g. Looking at going bigger in less than 6 months. As far as water, yes ro/di which i have my lfs premix with salt....but i still check before using. I've had to do several water changes. My tank isn't quite finished cycling, and well you know had to buy some fish. i'm keeping a close eye on things. Nope no basement.

 

[lion_crazz]

Here is my process for doing weekly water changes:
I have 2 trash cans. A good water bucket, and a bad water bucket. The two are never mixed. I have "good" on one, and "bad" on the other. Since I do 40 gallon water changes, I use a 45 gallon trash can.
Fill up a trash can with water. Pour the salt in. Guess-timate it the first time. Put a heater in, and heat it to the exact temperature of the tank. For the first 24 hours, put a powerhead on the bottom of the bucket/trash can to mix the water with the salt. Salt will fall to the bottom, so this is where you want your powerhead. After 24 hours has passed, bring the powerhead closer to the top to increase the oxygen. Dissolving salt with water uses the oxygen up in the water, so you need to replace this. You could use an airstone, but I just use a venturi powerhead because it sucks air in (I run 2 poweheads, one at the top, and one at the bottom, since I have such a huge trash can - you only need one). After the first 24 hours has passed, check the salinity and pH and adjust accordingly. If it is too high, add regular water. If it is too slow, add more salt. If your pH is different from your tank, check your alkalinity. Many times, you need to buffer alkalinity because there are some salts that you give a low alk level.
Once the salinity, pH, kH, and temp are EXACT to your tank, you are ready to do a water change.
When I do a water change, I never dump water into the tank. I have a 5 gallon bucket that I use to take water from my trash can. I put the five gallon bucket on the floor and pump water from the 5 gallon bucket to my sump using a small powerhead and some tubing. This way, the fish are not getting stressed out by you adding a lot of water to the top of the tank. They do not even realize that you are adding water to the tank because it is calm, plus all the water levels are identical to that of the tank. (Plus, this way is a lot less messy).
If you have any questions about this (or anything), please feel free to ask me.

 

[sleasia]

I mix my water 3 days ahead of when I need it...since sometimes the salt measures can end up very different I usually add more salt than I think I will need...then after 3 days I test and dilute the mix with r/o to sp gr of 1.025, which is what I keep my main tank at....then, I had been hauling the water over to the tank and pumping it in with a power head...but now....

since I plumbed the tank to the basement, I have my pump's intake on a "T" with ball valves on each end, one side to the sump, and one side to the salt mix bucket....I just shut off the pump a second, turn off the ball valve to the sump, and turn on the ball valve to the salt mix bucket, and let my pump pump the water up from the salt mix bucket in the basement up to the tank through the returns . When it is finished I shut off the pump again and switch things back to having the intake come from the sump again....no more bucket hauling....

 

[merredeth]

I keep a 50 gallon garbage can mised with saltwater for the changes. With multiple tanks, you need to have plenty on hand all the time.
I mix my salt with the powerhead and heater towards the bottom and move it up a little each time I drive the dar (mine is in my heated garage).
I then take a powerhead that I attached a tube to and put water in a five gallon jug.
When I do my living room tank, I then haul it upstairs to the catwalk put it on a plant stand that I made out of plywood and covered with mirror. I take the plant off the plant stand and put the fivegallon jug on it. I then run a drip line to my tank and let gravity take the water to into the tank.
Each time I go to the garage to do laundry (water changes are generally on laundry day), I then fill up other one gallon jugs and haul them to the catwalk and pour more water into the five gallon jug.
This way, should I make an error on temp, Ph or salinity readings I haven't stressed my fish out with any suddent changes.
I do the same for all the other rooms that have tanks in them as well. However, the one on the catwalk is the one that is full of corals, so water changes in that tank are more frequent.
It may take me about two days to refill the water in the tank, but it is done at my pace and no one is stressed out in the process. Plus, I seldom have any spillage and never had had a temperature fluctuation in the DTs doing things this way.
Denise M.

 

[hatessushi]

I do mine pretty much like lion_crazz (i know you cut and paste that lion because I follwed those instructions about 4 months ago

) does except I don't pump the water into the tank. When I did that it was to tough to hold the tube in the tank and shut the pump off at the same time since I don't want the pump to run dry. And if I tried attaching the tube on the tank to hold it in place then as soon as I turned the pump off the water would imediately start siphoning out of the tank. So I pour water out of the 5 gallon bucket into a smaller bucket and lift it up to pour into the sump/refugium which is the whole back section of the tank. It makes my arms ache after a while since I pour it slowly. I have to reach over the front to get to the back of the tank and do this on a 2 step step-ladder. My tank is about 4 feet off the floor on the cabinet so the top is about 6 1/2ft. up.
I tried it with a 35 gallon heavy duty trashcan and actually build a pvc run to the tank from the trashcan with valves and everything. I used a fairly good-sized mag pump (about 1000gph) but it heated the water up to much and my maxijet 900 would not pump the water up that high. So basically I am stuck at hauling the water and holding it steady to pour it in...doh! someday I will figure a way to get it to the tank easier.