me changing gravel to sand

[tRiP]

Sweet setup, I switched my 120 and 75 over to sand from gravel in January and couldn't believe how much nicer the sand looked. I was also surprised at how easy it was to vacuum. Don't think I can go back to gravel now.

CTU2fan what I did to prep the sand was dump a 50pound bag of pool filter sand into a large garbage bin, placed in the bathtub(was too cold outside) and just fill the bin half way, dump water, re-fill, dump etc and then once it was starting to look clear I filled the bin up all the way and let it overflow out for a couple minutes, dumped and then one last half fill rinse. Took about 30mins per 50 pounds before I was happy with the clarity of the water.

 

[fish head )'>]

the PFS was surprisingly clean. People who have used the play sand, which is more tan-ish in color, MUST be rinsed very well before you put in the tank, or you will be cloudy for awhile.

 

[fish head )'>]

STUPID FILTER!
Well.... okay, stupid me. You know how you read a post, but you don't listen or learn from it? Duh... I read in a post when doing research on this subject of changing to sand substrate, that you will get sand in you filter. Well I did, just like I was warned. But as you can see by the picture, I can only just barely change the filter on the big whisper. Well, I had to empty the entire tank and pull it out just to get to the H.O.T. filter that got sand in the impeller. I drilled a hole in the cabinet, and below is a 404 fluval canister that I had on my 125g for redundancy. I guess I'll buy a better suited for this tank--fluval 204 or 304 and use the hose that is already installed so I do not have to empty it again. BTW: It has been 10 days set up, before the sand cut the filter out.

Lesson: Read and learn from your MFK brothers and sisters!

 

[fish head )'>]

The Geos are in a larger tank waiting for their new home in a 55g head board tank. I am going with my first attempt planted tank. It is housing any/all non cichlids.