Need your help!! How would you rework an established tank?

hazzyeyed

New member
So what's up reefers? Really need your help here. I have a reef tank about 8 years old. 200 gallon. It needs some rework done. Badly.
I am busy as heck and so about a year ago got some mojanos in the tank.... well fast forward a year and i think you can guess how many i have now!
while I do have someone who maintains the tank, I somehow "œwon't blame anyone" got an outbreak of caleurpa to top this too. So I'm done... I wanna do the following but want to know your thoughts to minimize spiking etc

Goal is to completely start fresh with sand and liverock. I thought about doing this....

Take corals off live rock. I have mostly soft coral so chisel off and put all aside.
Take out live rock and power wash? Caluerpa and mojanos off.
Should I dip too? If so what and how. Use pieces that don't have any Mojanos and mix with newly purchased 100 lbs of life rock from Carib sea.
Suck out sand and filter so no Mojanos. Add some extra arag alive sand to mix. My bed was like 3" thick and not good. I want to keep that sand though for beneficial reasons.
Redo rock. Redo sand and then add back coral and fish???
Can I do in a day?? Should I keep coral and fish out separately for a while and then put back after making sure tank is balanced??
Need some advice. Thanks guys. :headwalls:
 
Whatever time frame you designate to any aquarium project TRIPLE IT.
Rinsing sand clean takes an enormous amount of time. That's why so many just replace it.
I'm not sure about Mojanos but peroxide will do in the Caleurpa, and most any other algae.
 
H2O2 will kill just about any living raw tissue it can get at. Use drug store strength, and soak rock one side at a time for 30 seconds. Then rinse that side briefly and set it in a vat of discard salt water until the bubbles (of pure oxygen) stop. Those bubbles can harm fish. After no bubbles you can replace in your tank. I'd pull all fish and corals to qt while dealing with sand bed and do a near total water change, because messing with sandbed can loose some real bad stuff.
 
I found a 30 gal tank.
I am going to transfer fish water and some rocks to hide eat on etc to that for a while.
Then start on my tank. Not to sound like a snob but I'm not too worried about some costs. I'm ok with replacing all the rock but I'm worried about spikes? I want to salvage what I can but don't wanna f myself and be cheap by salvaging rock with crap that will come back.
Walking on a thin wire man haaa
 
Before going the re-do route, consider asking Mother Nature for help. Add a tang to eat caulerpa and maybe a small army of peppermint shrimp to eat the nems. It'll take awhile, but it beats breaking down the tank.
 
A filefish will eat those majanos in no time, and a tank on the caulerpra. Scheduled water changes, siphon out some sand, small portions over time.
 
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