Is there a way to effectively clean sand?

[Anonymous]

I dont mean with sand sifters etc. I mean if I suck a bunch of sand out of my tank that has been in there for over a year, is it possible to rinse it clean in order to remove whatever nutrients might have been stuck in there?

Would I use RO water? Or maybe just water that went through a carbon filter? Or just tap water?

I'm thinking when I move my tank I'd like to reuse some of the sand in another tank and would like to keep it clean if possible.

 

[Len]

Are you planning on having the sand out of water for a long period of time, or are you looking to just rinse it before putting it into a new tank?

You won't be able to remove all the compounds binded into the aragonite matrices, but you can definitely rinse it to remove the detritus and other nasties. I wouldn't use tap. I'd use RO water or preferably clean saltwater.

 

[Anonymous]

Use 10M HCl to dissolve the sand, filter thru carbon, then precipitate the calcium carbonate out by adding NaOH.

Seriously, I would just use tap water. If you drain the water from the sand before you use them again, there is very little difference it makes either with RO/DI or tap.

 

[Len]

Would the porous sand absorb any containments in tapwater?

 

[Anonymous]

Yes, but unless you use the sand as filter media (like flushing gallons and gallons of tapwater thru it for hours), it does not absorb much unless you use nasty water from unfiltered well or murky river to wash it.

Alright, run the tap water thru the carbon filter before using it to wash sand, happy now, Len? :wink:

 

[Len]

estatic!

 

[Anonymous]

Wow, forgot about my own post! :O

But i dont plan on having it out of the water for a terribly large amount of time, ie not going to let it all dry out. I would like to try to save some life forms if possible. I just want to wash out all the junk which is preventing my tank from being nice due to poor skimming/water change habits before.

 

[Anonymous]

Wow, forgot about my own post! :O

But i dont plan on having it out of the water for a terribly large amount of time, ie not going to let it all dry out. I would like to try to save some life forms if possible. I just want to wash out all the junk which is preventing my tank from being nice due to poor skimming/water change habits before.

I would use clean saltwater then.