I HATE WASHING SAND!
- Thread starter soulFish
- Start date
A great way to decrease clouding is to clean the sand by putting some in a bucket and let water run in there until the sand is all covered. Dump the dirty water and repeat untill you've done all the sand. After you have done that, place it in the tank before any water has been in. SO now you have all the sand inside, you just place a hose on the ground, turn it on and wait. You may need to weight down the hose.
I find that maintaining my tank with sand is harder than washing sand initially cuz when maintaining, sand gets sucked up the tube before the fish dookie. the Dookie weighs more. Not easier than gravel as many say it is.
i get to do this for my 240 yey
this is how i do it and it works good
i put a bunch of sand in a bucket
add hose to bottom of bucket
turn on water
tilt bucket a bit so it can overflow
stir real good with my hands
dump water
continue to fill,stir,dump
do that till water is almost clear
then dump that sand in another bucket
do until the "clean sand" bucket is full
then when you add it to the tank,if theres water in it
scoop the sand out of the bucket with a smaller bucket or cup
lower small bucket into the water and pour it out at the bottom
this way the water doesnt get as cloudy.
adding sand to tank without water
when you fill it up with water put a dish or plate on the sand where the water is flowing and it wont stur up the sand as much
this is how i do it and it works good
i put a bunch of sand in a bucket
add hose to bottom of bucket
turn on water
tilt bucket a bit so it can overflow
stir real good with my hands
dump water
continue to fill,stir,dump
do that till water is almost clear
then dump that sand in another bucket
do until the "clean sand" bucket is full
then when you add it to the tank,if theres water in it
scoop the sand out of the bucket with a smaller bucket or cup
lower small bucket into the water and pour it out at the bottom
this way the water doesnt get as cloudy.
adding sand to tank without water
when you fill it up with water put a dish or plate on the sand where the water is flowing and it wont stur up the sand as much
Haha or Edwin, you can fail like I once did, trust the pre-rinsed label on the bag, dump it in a partially drained tank, and have the surprise of your life when you realize you can't see even 2 inches back, and your tank looks like an aquatic sandstorm in action. Then you basically end up rinsing all of it in the tank instead, and keep doing water changes, which much much much longer, but it is an alternative method and works.
Lesson learned: always rinse reguardless.
Lesson learned: always rinse reguardless.
So ive never used sand and always wondered if its harder to keep clean. Is it? Doesnt the vac just suck it all up?
ha. you hate washing sand? my previous job revolved around it. quality control for fill dirt coming in to replace contaminated dirt on a 36acre haz site.
for every 10-20 trucks i had to do:
gradation measurements. (drying 5gal of dirt in an oven, and running the dirt through ~8 seives) to find the amount of fines (%silt, %clay, %etc)
moisture measurements (weighing the dirt, then drying the dirt, and then weighing it again) to make sure it had the correct moisture for compaction
and we had roughly 100 trucks come in PER DAY
funny when you can tell people that you wash and dry dirt for a living. haha
for every 10-20 trucks i had to do:
gradation measurements. (drying 5gal of dirt in an oven, and running the dirt through ~8 seives) to find the amount of fines (%silt, %clay, %etc)
moisture measurements (weighing the dirt, then drying the dirt, and then weighing it again) to make sure it had the correct moisture for compaction
and we had roughly 100 trucks come in PER DAY
funny when you can tell people that you wash and dry dirt for a living. haha
Fish Eat Fish;1346025; said:
Depends on how fine the sand is but I've had that happen with some kinds of sand. The key is to vacum just over the top of the sand and not down in the sand. The thought with sand is all your dirt should just lay on top of the sand and not go down into it like gravel where you have to clean underneath the gravel. Bare bottom is easier than either sand or gravel but if I had to have substrate I'd go with sand.
BTW, pool filter sand should only require a quick rinse as it's a cleaner sand. Versus using play sand. That's the stuff you have to rinse forever to get clean.
an alternative to sand is Color quartz, it looks just like sand but is heavier and does not have to be washed at all. Its really not a probem for your filter due to it being heavier to sand and it comes on various colors, natural colors or blues, red and other non natural colors. color quartz come in a 51 lbs bag and is more expensive then pool sand but it is worth it. its anywhere from 20 thru 35 dollars per 51lb bag depending where you get it from. you can also get color quartz with its s type which is a little bigger then sand but smaller then gravel. To learn google color quartz or go to 3m.com. Its is really worth it .
