New Tank Set up Help

[The Red Stripe Warrior]

OK, Heres My Situation

I have Just purchased a new 4 foot Fish tank to replace my 3 foot one.

I have only 1 Area where My fish tank can go, and that is where my 3 foot fish tank currently is, So what I need to do is move my 3 foot tank to a Temp place while I move and set up my New 4 foot tank, What im un-sure of is the best way to do this

Heres My idea

Empty Water from 3 foot Tank into Large Buckets, Catch all the Fish and Put Them into buckets, Move the now Empty 3 foot tank to a Temp place, Slowly add the Old water from Buckets in to the tank, Add the Fish

Then Move my 4 foot into Place, Fully set it up with new water etc, Cycle it, Then After its fully Cycled Slowly move the Fish from my old Tank to my new one, When its fully done, I will be able to empty my Old tank, and Sell it

Does this Sound a Sensible option, Never done this and i want it to go smoothly, Any more Tips would be Great, I wont be Starting this till the end of the week

 

[daisycat]

We recently relocated our 30g to our garage to make space for the 400L. Despite having moved the 30g tank several times in the past for moving house, we managed to mess it up this time and the tank recycled itself and we lost our 3 cory cats and 2 armoured cats in an ammonia spike.

My tips to avoid the same thing happening to you are:
- Make sure you do it as fast as possible - we moved the whole thing in about 2 hours (between 2 of us) but it still seemed that the bacterial colonies had time to die off.
- Keep your substrate (gravel/sand) wet in the bottom of the tank and lift like that if possible. We had to scrape all the gravel out as we couldn't lift the tank with it in and I think that was one of the main problems that resulted in us losing bacteria.
- A day or two before you move the tank clear out your filter so it is working at full efficiency (don't clean it, just make sure nothing is blocked up). We didn't clean ours out as we thought it would help but actually it hindered the recycle process as water wasn't passing through the filter very much so it couldn't get to bacterial colonies in there very easily. Two days after we unblocked our filter the cycle resolved itself after having stuck with very high ammonia for the previous 2-3 weeks.

Good luck with it all and make sure you test your water daily for at least a week after you move the tank in case a cycle does begin again so you will be ready for it. If the cycle does start up you can immediately start doing daily water changes to ensure your fish don't die like ours did (we didn't even realise there was an ammonia spike going on until 2 of the cory cats died a few days after the tank move).

hth

 

[The Red Stripe Warrior]

Thanks for The Help, A test Kid is in order then

anymore for anymore

 

[Crookster]

I'm currently think of how to get round this myself as I'm upgrading soon.

What I was thinking was put something cylindrical under the stands like a can of coke but it would need to be stronger than that and then rolling it.

It would only work if you were moving it to the other end of the room though.

Why they don't put rollers on the damm things in the first place I'll never know!

 

[The Red Stripe Warrior]

Why they don't put rollers on the damm things in the first place I'll never know!

Very good Point, Im off To patent the Idea now

 

[JamesTasker]

If you are moving it to somewhere on the same floor and it has a stand and can fit around all the corners you can leave 2 inches of water and the fish in the tank, which saves a lot of time and effort catching them.

If you do this push, the stand not the aquariumas the side will come off if you try to. You can only do this if you think your stand is strong enough. This is what I did to move my 30gallon.

I stored the water in a big bucket and then put it straight back when it had been moved into position. It took about 1.5hours and I lost no fish. Keep the filter damp while you are doing it.

HTH

 

[nightlife20]

hi nath,

i recently had to do two lots of moves... not from room to room but from house to house...

few questions.

are u useing the same filters out of ur 3ft to put into the 4t?
are u useing the same substrate and decorations?
in other words is EVERYTHIN goin from the 3ft into the 4ft?

if so its a simple operation that wont need u cycling the tank over again.

but i dont want to go into to much unless ur completly strippin an startin over...

 

[nightlife20]

oh yeah an are u sellin me ur old tank )

 

[The Red Stripe Warrior]

No, I wont be using anything from My old tank, not even the Gravel

Brought a Setup of Ebay, Checkit out

Me New Tank

Picking it up on Wednesday, Cant wait

 

[The Red Stripe Warrior]

Oh yeh Cause Ill sell it, its the one thats in teh front window at teh Stoke
Fish shop

 

[nightlife20]

ohhhh green with envy <<<envy not sick)


i missed out on a 4ft for 40 quid the other day didnt half make me

so ur not keepin anythin out of the old tank apart from fish... wow its gonna take u roughly a month, is there anyone who could hold ur fish for u for a while?

tell u what if u sell me the tank at a low rate ill have the tank off u on the same day as u get urs, help u set urs up, transport ur fish and tank down to mine an look after them for u whilst u wait for ur new baby to cycle go on u know u want to hahahaha

 

[nightlife20]

is that the one in cabinet? cant remember havnt been to an lfs for a while now

 

[The Red Stripe Warrior]

no Just on a stand Like thing

Im not sure what im doing yet with this whole Situation But ill keep you updated,

I Didnt reallY Cycle my last tank the first time I brought one, i brought some of them bacteria Tablets that add Bacteria in your Tank and Left my tank to Settle for about 2 days,

So im hoping to Do that Again, But do you lot think thats a bad idea, Teh Box of these bacteria tablets say fish can be added after 24 hours

Im unsure to be honest,

U Moved house recently then?

 

[nightlife20]

no not moved house its when i sold my tank.

not many ppl on this forum will recomend them tablets, i too used them when i first set up but lost fish with them.

what fish do u have?
if u maybe kept for of ur more hardyer fish for cycling the tank it will help it quicker, and them tablets might help a bit...also for help why dont u use some of ur old filter media in ur new filter? thats what i did with my 4ft an it cycled in half the time.

ah yeah the basic 3ft set up.. well i wouldnt be interested in the stand lmao, iv already got one of them from my old 3ft.. the only things i be wanting is, the tank lights/unit, hood filters heater. wouldnt want the gravel as it would be converted into a sand tank lmao.

 

[nightlife20]

eek double post