Tank Teardown, Cleaning, Restarting - Q on the cleaning part

dankoos · 02/16/2019, 11:23 AM

So after about 8 years, the first 3 or 4 being great and the last few having a myriad of problems (mechanical failure, neglect, etc) I have decided it is time to completely break down my 90 gallon (with 55 gallon sump) in-wall tank and start fresh, mostly due to the fact my 100+ pounds of live rock is completely covered in manjo anemones (with some aiptasia thrown in for good measure). I am going to acidize or bleach the the rock (or both) and start fresh. I currently have 4 fish and plan on housing them in a 20 gallon tank with a few pieces of the current rock while I go through this process.

I have seen lots of threads on how to bleach/acidize the rock, what I have NOT seen is what anyone does to their tank to make sure any pests don't just get right back onto the rock once they are done. I am going to remove all of my sand (only about 1/4 - 1/2" thick layer) and manually remove anything that I see..but that still leaves my overflow pipes (1.5" size) and any other nooks and crannies where pests love to hang out.

My thought was to just fill the system up with tap water and add some bleach and run the system (the "system" just being a return pump) for a week or so like that hoping that the bleach will kill any pests left behind.

Has anyone ever done this or have another method they used to completely eliminate pests before starting over?

Once I am happy the whole thing is clean and my rock is "clean", I am just going to seed that rock with a couple pieces of live rock purchased locally and let it re-seed the old rock...maybe buy a bag of live sand as well.

fishyguy7 · 02/16/2019, 03:00 PM

I just recently did this in my 400g system. I removed all the rock and did multiple bleach soakings. For the system itself I cleaned things well then drained it and filled with two water and vinegar. I wouldn’t use bleach myself. In my system I used 5 gallons of vinegar. Don’t know if it was too much/not enough but after it looked brand new.

dankoos · 02/16/2019, 03:16 PM

How long did u run system with the vinegar?

02/16/2019, 11:23 AM	#1
dankoos Registered Member Join Date: Jan 2010 Location: Columbus, Ohio Posts: 271	Tank Teardown, Cleaning, Restarting - Q on the cleaning part So after about 8 years, the first 3 or 4 being great and the last few having a myriad of problems (mechanical failure, neglect, etc) I have decided it is time to completely break down my 90 gallon (with 55 gallon sump) in-wall tank and start fresh, mostly due to the fact my 100+ pounds of live rock is completely covered in manjo anemones (with some aiptasia thrown in for good measure). I am going to acidize or bleach the the rock (or both) and start fresh. I currently have 4 fish and plan on housing them in a 20 gallon tank with a few pieces of the current rock while I go through this process. I have seen lots of threads on how to bleach/acidize the rock, what I have NOT seen is what anyone does to their tank to make sure any pests don't just get right back onto the rock once they are done. I am going to remove all of my sand (only about 1/4 - 1/2" thick layer) and manually remove anything that I see..but that still leaves my overflow pipes (1.5" size) and any other nooks and crannies where pests love to hang out. My thought was to just fill the system up with tap water and add some bleach and run the system (the "system" just being a return pump) for a week or so like that hoping that the bleach will kill any pests left behind. Has anyone ever done this or have another method they used to completely eliminate pests before starting over? Once I am happy the whole thing is clean and my rock is "clean", I am just going to seed that rock with a couple pieces of live rock purchased locally and let it re-seed the old rock...maybe buy a bag of live sand as well.

02/16/2019, 03:00 PM	#2
fishyguy7 Registered Member Join Date: Jun 2009 Location: Fort Collins,CO Posts: 426	I just recently did this in my 400g system. I removed all the rock and did multiple bleach soakings. For the system itself I cleaned things well then drained it and filled with two water and vinegar. I wouldn’t use bleach myself. In my system I used 5 gallons of vinegar. Don’t know if it was too much/not enough but after it looked brand new.

02/16/2019, 03:16 PM	#3
dankoos Registered Member Join Date: Jan 2010 Location: Columbus, Ohio Posts: 271	How long did u run system with the vinegar?