sand bed replacement

[tony varrell]

I have a 5 year old reef tank that is healthy and doing well whith one exception. The sand bed appears to be dead. If you agitate it at all it becomes black. I wonder if I should replace the sand?Is that possible and does it have any consequences. It just dosen't look good anymore. I am looking for some suggestions on what to do. Thanks

[jedimike]

I just replaced my DSB. I don't think there is any real easy way to do it. I did mine in quarters. I would scoop out one quarter of the sand using a plastic cup and then replace it with fresh. I let the tank sit for a month to reseed the new sand. It probably doesn't take that long, but I wasn't looking forward to doing it so it was a good excuse to put it off

Now that it is over, I'm glad I did it. My DSB was at least 5 years old and not only looked nasty, but I was having a hard time keeping my phosphates and nitrates down. I think the DSB was saturated. I did lose 2 of my SPS frags... I think it was because of the inevitable sand storm. I tried to keep it to a minimum, but it is a difficult task.

[mg426]

I replaced my CC once. I just did about 25 % every couple weeks
Replacing the CC with sand. Nothing bad happened.

[Rouselb]

i found the best way to remove substrate is to use a wet/dry vac. Just buy a small hose and adaptor at HomeDepot, and you can remove it without any sand storm or stiring anything up.