Im removing my CC tomorrow and have a couple questions

[lil.guppy]

So I found this plastic thing with holes that work perfect for getting most of the CC out but leaving the sand. Some of the finer flaky CC gets through but im not too worried about it.
Question....................
1.Do I need to turn all my pumps and things off while doing this?
2. Should I only do little bits at a time everyday so I dont bomb the tank with sand clouds. (my poor clowns)
3. Im not removing my rock, so I am getting all the visual CC in the front and back of the tank.
Is that still going to make a difference or am I going to have to take ALL my rock out?

 

[janastasio]

I did this last year. I took out most of my rock and the fish. So much gets stirred up. Be prepared to do a good size water change as well. Usually when you stir up the bed, you can spike levels in your tank. My tank has been so much healthier since getting the CC out. Even though I siphoned it, it was always so dirty.

 

[lil.guppy]

Yea the small amount that i took out smelled and I see it collecting junk in the back.
I really really really dont want to move my rock, so I might have to do like one or two scoops a day. It will take be probably a month or two to get it all out, but this way I wont have to remove my rock.
So you like your tank now that you have done it?

 

[janastasio]

I like it so much better! I had a bare bottom for awhile, but it still collected things on the bottom. I added a very thin layer of sand this summer (25lbs in a 75 gallon), and just recently broke down my 20 gallon tank and added the LR and LS in from that system. I had thought about doing mine a little at a time as well, but it seemed to stir up a fair amount, even doing a little, so I wanted to get it over with. I took out majority of the water and had fresh mixed water to do a 25% change. I also did several water changes that week. My CC was quite old. I had had the system for 2 years and the person I bought it from had it 8 years. That was 10 years of alot of waste in that CC. I cannot even describe how gross it was.

 

[lil.guppy]

Mine has been up for less then a couple months but its crazy how much stuff is underneath that. All the sand is slowly making its way to the bottom and all that is left is the CC on the top.

 

[janastasio]

Yup

You are smart to remove it early on! Are you planning on adding more sand?

 

[nordy]

I changed out the CC in my 55 last year and I am sooo glad that I did it! I put all my corals in 5 gal buckets with a heater and PH in each bucket and they did fine. I pulled most of my rock too and placed that in buckets of SW for the duration of the changeout. My fish just had to tough it out and they all survived too. My CC had been in for about 6-7 years and it was so nasty and yeah, the tank was very cloudy and full of bad stuff. I had prepared ahead of time by getting some extra paper filter cartridges so I just kept changing them out as soon as the flow on my canister filter slowed down and by the next day the tank was crystal clear and it had that beautiful new sand bed!
One thing I strongly recommend-triple rinse your new sand before you place it in your tank! I can't emphasize this enough-there is a lot of fine dust and stuff in bags of sand and it will take a long time to settle out if you don't rinse it thoroughly.
Also, it would be a good idea to just go ahead and do everthing this one time-pull/move all your rock and just get all the CC changed out. You really do not want to face doing this again in the future and it will be absolutely worth it! Your clowns are pretty tough and shouldn't have any problems with changing the cc to sand.
Good luck and let us know how it went!

 

[lil.guppy]

Originally Posted by janastasio
http:///forum/post/2936800
Yup

You are smart to remove it early on! Are you planning on adding more sand?
I have a total of 80lbs, 60of sand and 20 of the CC. I will just go and get a 20lb bag of that live CC

 

[lil.guppy]

Ok well since I am moving in about 8 months that is when I will be able to get ALL of the cc out so I am not removing my rocks
I am doing it slowly every day though.
I took my siphon hose, took the end off and siphoned the sand and cc out into a bucket while removing water.
I then strain the cc out from that bucket. Remove the water and slowly scoop the sand back in by letting it fall out of the cup on the bottom of the tank. Then I added fresh salted water!
I was able to get a good 7-8 cups off CC out this morning! Its funny because the left side of my tank is sand and the middle and right side is that nasty looking CC. I cant wait to get it done!
The CC smelled pretty bad. I cant imagine what it was like for ya'll that had it for years.
I also saw debree floating over the sand versus the CC on the right side so this is going to be great!