Am I dreaming or have I seen a thread on here on how to work out how much substract you need for your tank?

If its so can somebody tell me where it is.

Thanks

basically how deep x how wide x how long you want to cover

So the same as the volume equation then?

So what ever number comes out make KG and your away laughing then?

Difficult to know if you dont have the density of the substrate you want to use. Could always weigh a litre of it and you can work it out from there.

Otherwise, buy too much. then you have plenty for your next tank

If I buy to much I will just put it in the one tank. I prefer diffrent looks in my tanks so try not to use the same styles in any of them

At a rough guess 1.25 to 1.5 x the L.

Builders sand is about 1.25 ton/m^3, builders mix is closer to 1.5 - all this if I'm not unforgetting wrong.

So 2200 Length x 500 widthx 80 height x 1.5 means that I need roughly 132 kg of sand. Does that sound about right?

I would go with the ~1.2 or 1.3 for (dry) sand so 100 to 110kg?

Coool thank you all for the help

So I finaly found some black sand and best of al I got given it for free.

My new question is, what is the best way of removing current suff?bstract and then adding the new stu

strip it down and start again

or siphon out then siphon back in

Siphon out siphon in with fish still in the tank?

I have syphoned out substrate several times with fish still in tank. Then added new sand substrate by rinsing it very well first, put in bucket and lower entire bucket into tank and then slowly tip out content onto bottom (entirely submerged) and then gently spread over bottom.

Gets a bit murky but mature filter will deal with that in a few days

Excellent, thanks for the help guys!

Will add some pics when I am done.

That is what I've done in the past, except I'm not so careful tipping it in! Turn the filters off (obviously), pile it all up down one end so it is easier to siphon, suck it out, tip the new stuff in, water change, done. You just need to watch it when you're siphoning as it can become compacted in the hose if you try to take too much at once or the siphon hose has a low point or a long flat run, I've found its best to have the hose continually running downwards to keep it flowing. It doesn't hurt to pre-heat the new substrate with a couple of jugs of boiling water too.

Why do you pre heat it?

TBH I've got no idea if it makes much difference, but last time I did it the tap water was ice cold and so was the substrate after washing it, so in the interest of trying to keep the temperature drop to a minimum I though it would make sense to try remove as much cold water from the new substrate as possible.

On that logic, I guess it makes sense. How much heat does substract keep?

Not sure how much of it is the actual substrate, or how much it is just the water surrounding it. But the stuff I took out of the tank felt a hell of a lot warmer than the cold stuff I'd just finished washing! Not sure why, but it always seems like washing substrate is something I end up doing during the colder months...

:facepalm:

On that logic, I guess it makes sense. How much heat does substract keep?

I'm still waiting for you to spell it correctly, getting closer. :slfg:

Siphoning outside into a bucket and just letting the bucket overflow works well. That way all the substrate collects in the bucket.

I'm still waiting for you to spell it correctly, getting closer. :slfg:

Yeh but if I start spelling stuff correctly it will give you no reason to come online anymore, or even live for that matter. So I guess I should keep making mistakes to give you something to do with your very important time.

Siphoning outside into a bucket and just letting the bucket overflow works well. That way all the substrate collects in the bucket.

Good idea, expect it will take a lot of buckets and I am gunna just throw it into the garden anyway so I mite as well just siphon it strait into the garden

Just make sure the end of the hose is up so it doesn't get blocked as the substrate piles up. Trying to free a hose that is blocked with wet impacted sand is a real PITA!

thanks for the tip, will keep an eye on that come the day