My 50 gallon tank is easy, I use a small pump with a hose to drain the sump into two buckets. I dump the buckets and refill them from my mixing tank, then using the same small pump, pump it back into the sump. When the sump is emptied, I usually try to clean out any detritus that has accumulated and do any other maintenance that is required. I also service and clean my skimmer then.
On my reef tank I do sort of the same proceedure, but instead of using buckets, I pump the water into a floor drain in my furnace room through a long hose. I have a fitting that goes onto the coupler of my return pump and has the hose connection to drain the sump. Once again, clean up the sump and equipment while its empty. To refill, I connect the hose to the pump on my mixing tank, and refill the sump. I also need to drain a small amount of water, 4-5 gallons, from the main tank to make up the full water change volume of 25 gallons. To do that, I have a fitting and a valve off of my closed loop plumbing that I can attach the hose to.
My mixing tank is set up to keep mixed water on hand all the time (in case of emergencies). It holds 25 gallons, exactly what I need for the reef tank. My 50 gallon tank gets only 10 gallons changed at a time. I alternate water changes every week, so each tank gets done every other week (more or less).
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I retired and got a fixed income but it's broke.
Ed
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50 gallon FOWLR, 10 gallon sump.
130 gallon reef, 20 gallon sump, 10 gallon refugium.
10 gallon quarantine.
60 gallon winter tank for pond fish.
300 gallon pond with waterfall.
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