Water change ideas

[WarDog]

To drain water out of the tank, just use gravity.

Also, here's an idea.

http://www.canreef.com/vbulletin/sho...&postcount=329

[Frogger]

Not sure you want to drain the water into the storm drain. Storm drains feed directly into creeks untreated. Not only is salt water not good for the streams there are other environmental issues.

[sobe]

I drain mine in the toilet. I fashioned a U pipe out of pvc. That hooks into the toilet and use a maxi jet pump inside the tank connected to a pvc hose. Then i have those extension cord with switch on it so i can control on/off the pump.. Flush toilet several times after wards. I do the toilet cleaning at the same time

If im on vacuuming gravel regimen which is every 3rd water change it goes outside the street. I gravel vac into a rubber maid tub. Then have a stronger pump in the tub to pump it outside.

For new water rubber maid tough guard the grey commercial garbage can i use beside the display tank and run rodi tube to it and do mix the day before changing. I use and old quite one pump to pump it to the display.

Frogger what happens in winter when city are salting , brining the street? Its basically the same salt that goes to the storm drain. I understand winter salting only happens in one season in a year. Compared to us changing water every week. I guess its subjective. Same could be said about rodi water we are wasting water since alot of us do not store the discarded water when making ro or di water.

[Frogger]

Frogger what happens in winter when city are salting , brining the street? Its basically the same salt that goes to the storm drain. I understand winter salting only happens in one season in a year. Compared to us changing water every week. I guess its subjective. Same could be said about rodi water we are wasting water since alot of us do not store the discarded water when making ro or di water.

In the winter when we are getting a lot of rain the salt is thinned and washed away. The damage it does to the environment is accepted because the alternative is major accidents and loss of live. In the summer when it hasn't rained in a couple months , the baby salmon fry are actively feeding the salt we release would be much more concentrated in the streams.

Its not just the salt. It is the organisms that we culture some good some bad, who knows how they can affect the fish and organisms within the creek ecosystems. Same reason we shouldn't release our tank inhabitants into the wild ecosystem.

[smokinreefer]

Good points!

If it were "just" salt water i'd be inclined to say go for it and dump it to the storm drain.

But you've raised a good point, it's not so much "just" the saltwater but the foreign micro and macro organisms that come with it.

Not really on par with this, but think lionfish. And what a devastation it has been to the ecosystems that it has been unaturally introduced to.

[smokinreefer]

Anyways...
Do you have a laundry sink?

For the longest time I used a "python" gravel cleaner system that attaches to your faucet. I'd use that to drain the tank.

And when that broke, I simply used the hose from it and gravity drained it into the bathtub.

[Dash]

Thanks for all the feedback everyone.

Currently I use a simple aquarium siphon to get pull water out and vacuum the sand at the same time. My sand bed is on the thin side (1” or less) and when I started out I couldn’t get my nitrates under 20 for a long time despite a low bioload. Then I saw a video of someone deep vacuuming their sand and decided to try it. Almost immediately my nitrates went down to undetectable levels. So that’s worked for me. I siphon into buckets which I dump into the laundry tub. The only reason I thought of the storm drain is because of the gravity issue - a hose wouldn’t have to go up into the tub. (Thanks for making that point Frogger; I don’t want to do something that would negatively impact the environment. In fact that’s one of the reasons I don’t do RODI but that’s a whole other can of worms) I would like to continue vacuuming my sand, but I just want to eliminate the treks back and forth. Yes I’m lazy. You’d think the exercise would do me good

So perhaps I could siphon into a large bin, then pump that waste water into the laundry tub? Is it simpy fitting a pump onto a long hose? (This occurred to me as I recently watched the pump work on my return line, first time using a sump - I am learning something new every day haha). What kind of pump would I need?

I’ve thought of the Python - wasn’t sure how it worked. Maybe it would be easier to buy one of those instead of trying to jerry rig something myself. But would I still be able to vacuum my sand in the same way?