[RHINO13]

Ok guys I guess im going to tear her down and try wash it Randy style.I guess I have couple questions still though

1) What should I use to do the scrubing,is a new sponge that you wash the dishes with ok,and will the rough side of the sponge scratch my tank up?

2) there are different types of vinegar,is any of them better to use for this?

3)And last how many parts of bleach to parts of water should I use for the second scrubing stage?

I can't say thanks enough to you guys,so thanks again!!

[RHINO13]

Once I do wash the tank and get ready to set up waht do you mean

try to set it up with just sand. Seed the sand with live sand from established sand from an establish tank (rubble from live rock tank or sand from LFS reef tank is OK), and add a snail or two as test subjects. Don't buy live rock but you and get some limestone so the tank has some solid surface for algae to grow and the snail to craw on.

I like how the sand I have now texture is(not to fine). Are you saying to use the crushed limestone from home depot as my sandbed,then get livesand from an established tank to add to the top of the limestone?And my last question do lfs sell in such a way?How much of this should i ask them to sell me?

Thanks again and again after that

[Ninong]

Originally Posted by RHINO13

1) What should I use to do the scrubing,is a new sponge that you wash the dishes with ok,

Sure.

and will the rough side of the sponge scratch my tank up?

No, not if you get the normal kind. I wouldn't get one of those really rough things that are designed for scrubbing pots and pans.

2) there are different types of vinegar,is any of them better to use for this?

Plain white vinegar with nothing added. Get it in the giant economy size, by the gallon.

3)And last how many parts of bleach to parts of water should I use for the second scrubing stage?

I've never had to do this myself but if I ever did, I think I would use one cup of bleach per quart of water. That sounds pretty strong to me. And wear protective gloves!

P.S. -- I think I would use the vinegar at full strengh. Wear gloves! Pour one or two gallons of plain white vinegar into the empty tank and then used the sponge to wipe down the walls of the tank repeatedly with the vinegar for maybe a good half hour. Then leave it alone for an hour or so and then go back and repeat the procedure another time. Then rinse it out thoroughly before proceeding to the bleach treatment. After you clean it with bleach, rinse it out very thoroughly and allow it to air dry. Then rinse it out again. You want to make sure there is absolutely no bleach residue in the tank.

[Ninong]

I think what Minh was trying to tell you is that if you're trying to save money, you could use plain old dolomite from the hardware store. If you do this, then I think you should remove it and discard it once you are sure the tank is safe for inverts. I would probably just go with regular aragonite sand from the beginning on the assumption that the copper problem has gone away.

I would definitely go with regular aragonite sand for the permanent set-up, especially since your tank is only 46 gallons and won't require a whole lot of it.

The other point Minh was trying to get across is that after you clean the tank thoroughly and set it up again, you should add the new sand and new saltwater and then add only a small amount of cheapy live rock rubble or maybe even just a piece of plain limestone along with a few "test" snails. If there is still a copper problem, the snails will die off within a week or two. If the snails survive for two or three weeks without showing signs of distress, then it would be OK to add expensive live rock and maybe some more clean-up critters and eventually fish and other livestock. In other words, use just a few snails and just a little cheapy rock for them to live on in the beginning to make sure the system is free of copper before buying expensive live rock.

P.S. -- Obviously you will have to feed the snails since there will be nothing in the tank for them to graze on.

[RHINO13]

Ninong I know this is probally a stupid question but I must ask.

after you clean the tank thoroughly and set it up again, you should add the new sand and new saltwater and then add only a small amount of cheapy live rock rubble or maybe even just a piece of plain limestone along with a few "test" snails.

You mean to add the few test snails after my tank has cycled right?And I thought that the more live rock the faster the tank will cycle.I have read that adding a raw uncooked shrimp will help it along,should i do this with my live rock rubble? And last if these snails do live,when I went to add more live rock wouldn't this produce another cycle?The reason I ask that is would i have to remove the snails during this new cycle?

Thanks

[Ninong]

You don't have to wait for the tank to cycle before adding a few test snails. As long as you use cured live rock rubble or plain old limestone, the snails will not be harmed by any ammonia from any dying life in the live rock. The only reason you are adding a few snails is to make sure there is no copper in the tank. The reason you need to add either some live rock rubble or a piece of plain limestone is to give the snails something to live on and to give the copper, assuming there is any still adsorbed to the glass walls of the tank, a calcium carbonate surface to adsorb to.

If the snails survive for a couple of weeks without any obvious signs of distress, then you are good to go with new live rock, etc.

All of that is just to be extra cautious before wasting good, expensive live rock. If you don't want to bother with that step, then just make sure you clean the tank thoroughly and go with the regular expensive aragonite sand and expensive live rock from the beginning. And keep your fingers crossed.

You can add snails to a newly set up tank once the ammonia has dropped to undetectable and the nitrite has spiked and then dropped down to almost undetectable levels, say around 0.1-0.2 ppm, and the nitrate has spiked and dropped down to around 50 ppm. If you use fully cured live rock, you may have no detectable ammonia spike at all. If there is one, it may last only a matter of hours and not get very high. How long the initial cycle lasts depends on how much die-off, if any, there is in the live rock.

With fully cured live rock, you might be able to start adding snails within a week and with uncured live rock, you may need to wait three weeks or longer.

The tank begins to cycle the minute you add saltwater to it. Adding a sand bed and live rock just gives the beneficial bacteria more surface area to colonize. If you start out with just a few pieces of live rock rubble and a few snails, you will have a mini-cycle. The bacteria that will colonize the system (including the sand bed and the live rock rubble) will be sufficient to utilize the minute quantities of ammonia/nitrogen produced by the snails. In other words, the system will be in equilibrium with the available nutrients.

Once you add more live rock, the system will adjust to the added bioload. If this live rock is uncured, you will have noticeable die-off that will cause an ammonia spike. If it is fully-cured live rock, you will have almost no die off at all. Either way the tank will cycle to achieve a new equilibrium. The initial snails will almost certainly survive the addition of fully-cured live rock and they may survive the addition of uncured live rock, depending on just how uncured it really is.

[RHINO13]

Thanks any suggestions on type of test snails?

[RHINO13]

Im sorry guys but I just thought of another question. Do you guys think that either the vinegar or bleach/water solution will harm the seams of my tank(its not a seamless bow front)

[Ninong]

Originally Posted by RHINO13

Thanks any suggestions on type of test snails?

It doesn't really matter. Whatever is available locally. Two or three Trochus grazers would do.

[Ninong]

Originally Posted by RHINO13

Im sorry guys but I just thought of another question. Do you guys think that either the vinegar or bleach/water solution will harm the seams of my tank(its not a seamless bow front)

No, neither the vinegar nor the bleach will harm the silicone seals.

[RHINO13]

Thanks guys I guess its time to get to work. I will keep you posted( more for my sake than yours haha) Im so glad i caught this before wasting alot of more money.

Thank you for all your time,
Ryan

[Ninong]

If you want to know what I would do personally in this situation (assuming I had decided to clean the tank and use it as a reef tank), I would clean it thoroughly and then set it up with my choice of aragonite sand and a couple of inexpensive pieces of live rock from the LFS. Whatever is the cheapest fully-cured stuff they have. Then, after waiting maybe four or five days, I would add maybe three or four test snails.

I would fully expect them to survive without problems. The reason I would add the regular aragonite sand from the beginning is because I would fully expect that there would be no problems; but, just to be on the safe side, I would hold off on buying all of the live rock in the very beginning. I would add just a little live rock and a few snails and then see if they survived for two or three weeks before adding the rest of my live rock.

[RHINO13]

Thanks Ninong,that is exactly what I was thinking.It is good to know you were too.Also i live in an appartment building where there are two different buildings.The reason im stating so, is that the other building got there new copper pipes about two months ago. So I plan on useing their water hose for the rinsing.Don't really know if it would help much but im assuming it would be better than mine(new copper pipes like two weeks ago)

[RHINO13]

Wow that was fun! After about 4 hours of on and off scrubing and rinsing im finally done. It isn't very motivating scrubing like that when you can't see results.Im going to do one last 15 min rinse( I rinsed for about 15 min after the bleach scrub)
Is there any way to tell if i have rinsed all traces of bleach?

Oh yeah I found a new 46 gal bowfront for $179,so at least i know how much money I would have saved,or how much money I should have spent to save the time and effort. Only time will tell now

Thanks guys