I went to pick up some quikrete play sand for my new reef tank but noticed that it contained silicates. I ended up going with the Quikrete pool filter sand. It didn't say anything on the bag about having silicates. I used a different brand of pool sand in my freshwater planted tank and never had any problems. Do you think this sand will be OK to use? It's going to be a reef tank with about 5-10 lbs of live rock (It's a 10 gallon) and quite a few zoanthids.
Is Quikrete Pool Filter sand OK to use?
- Thread starter zmazza
- Start date
Yes, that should be fine, as long as it does not have the high silicates in it..
Play sand is used so much these days in starting up a marine tank...Any play sand does the job, as long as it has minimal or no silicates in it..
Dont know about over there in the US, but here in the UK, all play has the silicate levels on the bags..
Niko
Play sand is used so much these days in starting up a marine tank...Any play sand does the job, as long as it has minimal or no silicates in it..
Dont know about over there in the US, but here in the UK, all play has the silicate levels on the bags..
Niko
Sounds good. The quikrete play sand had a warning on the back about using it as a blasting agent. It stated that it was a crystalized silicate based sand? I can't quite remember. It stated that it caused NUMEROUS side effects if you breathed the dust from it, so I went with the pool filter sand instead. It didn't mention anything about bieng silicate based. It just said pool filter sand and stated that you should check with your pool filter manufacturer about how to use the sand and other things. Nothing about silicate level though, so I figured it would be the better choice, even though it's probably just the same thing, just a bigger grain.
Jolly good, am sure if anybody on the forums has used it before and had any bad experiences with it, they will shout up, am sure of that...
Keep us informed how you get on with it all
Niko
Keep us informed how you get on with it all
Niko
The only problem with silicate based sands is that you will have an extended diatom bloom ,"sometimes for over a month.: Arogonite based sands might have a little buffering ability but, only a little so....... it really doesn't really matter all that much. What's more important is grain size go for sand grains about the size of sugar crystals .
Hth
Max
Hth
Max
This pool sand looks like it may have a larger grain size, but I think it's going to work out very well.
I'll post some pics. It should be up and running by this weekend. I've got some cured rock and some extra water from my 29 gallon, as well as some seeded sand. Instant cycle! :dive:
I'll post some pics. It should be up and running by this weekend. I've got some cured rock and some extra water from my 29 gallon, as well as some seeded sand. Instant cycle! :dive: