How Do I Empty And Clean Tank?

[cmock]

I have a 29 gal. tank with a large oranda and a large pleco. I know, I should get rid of them. But, I went away for a while and the person feeding over fed. The fish are fine, except oranda now has a bump on her side.
But I just pumped out a few gals and the bottom is really, really dirty. Stirs up a lot of "dirt" and water is greenish brown. It definitely needs to be emptied, but I'm worried about cycling. How should I go about it? Empty tank, start with fresh water and leave sponge in filter dirty? HELP!!
Thanks!

 

[mypapercuthurts]

Do you just take out water from your tank? If so, get a suction tube thing that has a mouth for sucking up particles from the gravel. Get some like particle settling stuff or water clarifier from your lfs. Take your sponge out of your filter and clean it. But not all the way your tank needs the bacteria and life forms from the filter.
But still make frequent water changes like umm... 10% every day i guess. Wait for more replies and then make your decision.

 

[Don155]

Just make sure to gently clean the filter sponge in declorinated water. You will need to vac up the gravel substrate. You might also wat to add some carbon to your filter for a few days to clean excess organics out of the water. Don't worry too much about the water itself. Do a 50% change today and then another 50% change in a day or two. Continue this until the tank is sufficiently clean.

 

[cmock]

Thank you! I do have a gravel vac. I did that and when I cleared away the gravel, OMG, lots and lots of gunk in the bottom filter. How do I clean that out? Do I need to take everything out and remove it? I just changed the charcoal in the bottom filter and rinsed the sponge out in the old water. I did about a 50% water change. Which brings up another question.....when I add the Aqua Safe for decholorinating, it states 1 capful for every 10 gallons. Does that mean every 10 gallons that I'm adding or the total water in tank?

 

[dylema]

when I add the Aqua Safe for decholorinating, it states 1 capful for every 10 gallons. Does that mean every 10 gallons that I'm adding or the total water in tank?

Every 10 gallons you are adding. So when you get 10g out of the tap treat that in the bucket before you add it to the tank is best.

When you are making large water changes be especially careful to get the temperature of the water you're adding the same as the tank water. What kind of filters do you have? sounds like an under gravel filter (UGF)? If so is it powered bye an airline or a pump? If it is a pump can you reverse the flow and add another filter to help get all the muck out of the gravel? If it is too gunked up the UGF will not really be working well and you may need to pull it out and replace with something else like an internal filter or HOB etc.

I would just say keep up water changes probably no more than 50% at a time and keep sucking the gunk out of the gravel ever few days and keep the sponge clean by rinsing it in tank water.

Good luck.

 

[JaminRat]

AquaSafe is quoted as 5ml per 10 Litres. This may make like easier as 1 bucket will hold around 12 litres. I mix one bucket at a time then add it to the tank.