# Upgrading my tank, what do I need to know?



## lkfishy (May 13, 2012)

I have a 20 gal saltwater tank and we are moving, so I have been dreading transporting my fishes and coral safely across town. We are also going to upgrade our tank to a bigger one, so we figured we would do the move/upgrade at the same time so we wouldn't have to set up the small tank at the new house, and then take it down 2 weeks later and put up a bigger one. I am hopefully buying a 65 gallon truvu hex tank/stand off craigslist tomorrow (if its in nice shape like the ad says it is...) and I want to know everything I need to consider when upgrading my tank, and transporting my animals.
This is what I was thinking:
Use 5 gallon buckets with lids to hold ALL the water and livestock from my tank. A separate bucket for the live rock. . Then I will dump all the sand from the 20 gal into the 65 gal. Luckily I have an SUV so I will load the buckets and the hex tank with sand in my car and make the nervous trip across town!

Once at the new house I will add a few new bags of sand to the big tank and put all the water, live rock, animals and heater into it. Now this is where I have questions. Since I am adding way more water than is already in the tank, do I have to do it slowly like a drip system to fill my tank the rest of the way? Or can I just add 45 gallons of new water if the parameters match? I will have 9-10 buckets of water pre-mixed and ready. Once I get the tank full I can turn on the filter with already established bacteria and I should be good to go right? Other than adding more live rock sometime soon. I am very nervous about this so any feedback or advice on my plan is appreciated! Thanks.


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## Bawl (Aug 15, 2012)

I just finished moving, lugging all my tanks along with me. Total pain! Anyway, the way I did it was to set up a large plastic tote at the new place as a temporary tank with just a heater and a few pumps. I filled it and mixed up new water, letting it set about a day to stabilize, then moved all the rock and corals and whatnot over and placed them in that for a few days while I got the tank moved over and set back up. Getting the tank moved and back together, or in your case a new tank set up, takes quite a while. Long enough for the temperature in all those buckets to start changing. I'd definitely recommend some sort of temporary tank.


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## lkfishy (May 13, 2012)

Ok, good to know. Do you think using the 65 tall hex (its narrower than the 20gal long so it will be deep enough) full of only 20 gallons of water with a heater is a good temporary tank? I could just slowly add water over a few days so the temp has time to normalize... I really want to get everything over to the new house in one day.


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## lkfishy (May 13, 2012)

So I got the tank! It's beautiful, a truvu 60 gal hex with oak stand, filter, heater, light, air pumps/stones, a 25 ft python tank hose + various water chems and decor for only $200. It was used as a freshwater but only has 6 neon tetras in it, so I will be adopting them for my 20 gal that will now be my freshwater. 
I will be making the move on saturday, hopefully I can post pictures of my tanks once they are all set up at the new house and I am not stressing out over it anymore.


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