How the heck do you wash sand?

WashingtonCowgirl

I just bought 100 pounds of playsand to put in my various tanks, but I can't figure out how in the heck to rinse it! Help! :)

Boredomb

The way I did it (right wrong or indifferent) is I put some in a bucket and stuck a water hose in it and and filled it up. Then I dumped the water and repeated the process till the water was clear. That method was kinda slow and messy but it worked for me just a thought good luck and maybe someone else will have a better idea.

Thoth

^ basically that is what i do. I just wanted to add that if you stir the sand up, you will more quickly remove debris from the sand. If you dont clean the sand well enough, the tank will be very cloudy, which will require very large water changes to clear up.

WashingtonCowgirl

Just got done cleaning the sand using that method and putting it in the tank... It looks a little cloudy, but not bad at all. How long till we can turn the filters on again?

Boredomb

Well that I don't know my tank wasn't that cloudy. Soo not knowing any better I ran my filter from the start with the carbon pad in it cleared it right up in a couple of hours. Sorry I wasn't aware you should wait till the sand settled?

WashingtonCowgirl

I don't know if you have to... but I thought I read somewhere you were supposed to lol

Boredomb

The tanks I have the sand in are only 10 gallons though, Yeah I forgot to mention the stirring up the sand part I also do that with the water hose stick it all the way to the bottom and stir up the sand with it l

Boredomb

If you are worried about it I would say let it settle over night and you should be fine

excal88

Usually letting the sand settle for about 10-15 minutes is a safe bet for the tank before turning on the filter. You don't want to turn on the filter if there's lots of sand particles floating around because those particles can potentially jam up/break your filter.

For cleaning sand there's only 1 real way to do it properly, and thats taking a hose, a big bucket, and swishing the sand around it via water pressure until its completely clear. It takes some time, but its worth it as some of the dust particles in the sand can potentially harm your fish.

Boredomb

Thanks you know I never put much thought into the particles messing up the filter makes sense though