Hopefully you didn't have raised wheeler wells to deal with
It did unfortunately, big 'ol sharp, metal wheel wells! I was able to tetris everything in though, and brought towels, moving blankets + sheets, tie-downs - and everything else I could think of like a drill, sawzall (which came in handy, some bulkhead threads were stripped and others stuck/frozen in place after so many years).
For expediency sake I ended up just hacking out all the plumbing - as we had to spend quite a bit of time digging out the rockwork and old, thick sandbed, which a jackhammer would've struggled with. And the one thing I didn't bring was a ladder (or a gardening shovel, which I had placed in the garage but missed on the way out), so I had to use his little 9" step-stool to be able to reach in and dig it (top rim of the tank is 5 feet high on the stand) out while trying to break through the crust and scoop it out with a 2 gallon bucket and a tupperware my wife happened to have in the car! I used the tupperware to scoop in to the 2 gallon bucket, which was then dumped in a 5 gallon bucket. Rinse, repeat 5000 times. Sheesh.
It took about an hour to clear it out enough to lift, then we had to dismantle, and haul out. It took quite a bit of effort to separate the tank from the stand - and I got my thumb completely smashed in the process. Pretty sure it was broken, and I should have had it looked after, but I mean, it's just a thumb right? Apparently I was ghost white after from what my wife said, it got me good - but I bucked up and hauled it to the truck.
The dollies and moving carts were basically worthless, his front entry walkway was about 20 yards from door to street, and just WRECKED - a rock-crawling jeep would have a hard time getting down it - so we had to carry everything by hand and try not to trip, it was seriously dangerous and wildly uneven footing with huge cracks and splits in the concrete, one side often jutting 3-4 inches higher on one side than the other. But I didn't want to be hauling everything across his lawn... so we dealt with it. Surprised I managed to not roll an ankle lugging a 400lb glass tank, by hand, no suction cups, nor moving straps from what felt like the Earth to the Moon! Also why is the back of the Uhaul so damn high? Luckily I brought the ramp I used to load my old race bike in the truck with, so I had my wife run ahead of us and set a beach towel down on it, and we were able just slide it in by pulling the towel up the ramp. My thumb really hurt, the nail was already black and blue with a bit of blood seeping out from the cuticle, and the joint was severely swollen and getting tough to bend.
This setup was top notch back in the day for sure, but after a couple of years of neglect he just gave up on it, powered everything off and left it.. EVERYTHING was cemented together by years of salt creep, and evaporation from the remaining tank and sump water over the following year(s) coated everything in bullet proof grade salt encrustment! It was a very crunchy job, and I should have brought a chisel and a proper shovel too
Here's a few pics from the ad, you can see it's right against the wall on the left, I could barely fit my arm in there (my thumb fit just fine though). And everything was pieced together and assembled in place, which meant complete disassembly - even the brace on the back of the stand had to come out as the sump was too large to fit through the stand front doors! - notice the METAL ELECTRICAL BOX in the sump/skimmer pic - just, yikes (they had plastic on top of the hood for lights and controllers, don't understand the mentality there). I will say whomever plumbed it did a fantastic job - the drain, return, and cooler were all plumbed in beautifully, I kinda felt bad hacking them apart. Let me just say I HATE HATE HATE plumbing (especially sprinklers)! I was in the trades for over 15 years, and was actually in the process of getting my contractors license when I blew my knee out and sheared my tibia in half (tibial plateau fracture, I do not recommend - but that's a story for another time!), and actively avoided any plumbing work whenever possible! Mad respect to Eric and all the plumbers out there, plumbing is a tough, shitty (see what I did there?) job.
