Calcium problems.

[StirCrazy]

well for the last 3 months I have been having a hard time keeping my calcium levels up.. and they have slowly been falling, I hooked up my Calcium reactor and that fixed my low alk right away but my calcium was still low (it was comming up but very slowly and not at a steady rate) so I tested again and my Ca was the same as two days previous. so I was reading and I stumbled across a article about magnesium levels and ca levels and I started wondering if my Mg levels were maby low and it was interfearing with my Ca levles. So when I went to the meating I bought a Mg test kit at J&L and today I did a full range of tests..

what I found was that my Mg level is only a little over 1/2 of what it should be ( I got 800 ppm for a result and NSW is 1300 to 1500)

so today I called J&L and ordered seachem Mg suplement (and a couple books smile.gif )

so I will bring my levels up to proper and keep you informed of the results. the main article that got me thinking was one stating that some of the big salt companies cut down the amount of Mg in there mixes to save on money.. so I am going to test a batch of new salt mix on my next water change and see what that comes out at.. if it is normal then something in my tank is depleating Mg.

Steve

[SuperFudge]

Bump up co2 and effluent rates both preportionatly(sp?) and monitor results.

Alk should stay (close) to the same while Ca ++ levels will rise.

I would refrain from adding any Mg until yor reactor has been dialed in to meet your demands.
Then it may be a better time to test, and add if needed.

What is your alk and Ca++ now?

[StirCrazy]

Originally posted by Superfudge:
Bump up co2 and effluent rates both preportionatly(sp?) and monitor results.

Alk should stay (close) to the same while Ca ++ levels will rise.

I would refrain from adding any Mg until yor reactor has been dialed in to meet your demands.
Then it may be a better time to test, and add if needed.

What is your alk and Ca++ now?<font size="2" face="Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif">well I dialed it in and it is steady my tank alk is 10.7 and my effulent alk is 22. my feed rate is 2 gph and I am running 60 bbpm.
my tank Ca is up today from last reading by another 10 ppm for a whopping 210ppm the effulent ca level is 380 ppm, the effulant values have been stable for over a week and the tank Alk has been stable sence I hooked the reactor up (almost two weeks ago) the only changing varable is the Ca wich isn't responding as it should..

my Mg tests today confermed what I thought and I will bring it up vary slowly to ~1200 ppm whare everything I have read says it should be at a min.. also documents show that levels of 800 and less can lead to Ca crashes so I want to get safe from that at the least..

Steve

[ 15 September 2002, 21:58: Message edited by: StirCrazy ]

[titus]

Hello,

I'd increase the CO2 and effluent rate. Your Ca level from your reactor is rather low. It could be a lot higher.

But please e-mail me once you find out if it's the magnesium that's playing tricks with you.

Titus

[reefburnaby]

Hi,

One way to increase magnesium is to add epsom salts (available at most large drugs stores). The other way is to get some domolite (yah...that stuff you put on your lawn) and put it in the calcium reactor. The reactor will release the magnesium and bring it back up and maintain magnesium levels

In a normal reef system, the magnesium levels will eventually fall. This is a naturally occuring thing and it is what forms the ocean beds -- which are calcite, domolite and aragonite. Depending on the magnesium and calcium levels, the calcium and magnesium will eventually become one of those three rock types. I am a bit surprise that your magnesium levels are so low in such a short time. So, I would double check those results. One way of dropping magnesium levels very fast is to supersaturate the calcium, but I doubt that happened.

In the early days, magnesium defficiency was a normal thing and epsom salts were the common cure. So, salt manufacturers jacked up the magnesium to above NSW to account for the precipitated magnesium. Maybe, there is a reversal in this trend.

I can't remember who wrote those articles in the old days...but I think Randy mentions it in his recent ones.

Hope that helps.

- Victor.

[ 16 September 2002, 00:06: Message edited by: reefburnaby ]

[StirCrazy]

Originally posted by Titus:
Hello,

I'd increase the CO2 and effluent rate. Your Ca level from your reactor is rather low. It could be a lot higher.

But please e-mail me once you find out if it's the magnesium that's playing tricks with you.

Titus<font size="2" face="Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif">ok ow question I have about this.. Also for you Marc, if I increase both my feed rate and my co2 I stay the same. shouldent I just be increasing my co2 to get mode desolving? maby I am not understanding something here but if I increas both equaly then i just put more water of the same proportion don't I?

also tell me if you think my thinking is screwed but this is my theory on the low ca level outof the reactor..

Sence you need a higher Mg level to get 420ish ca levels wouldent it stand to reason that if the water you are putting through your reactor is deficient in Mg then it won't be able to desolve a lot of Ca? so if this is the case maby the reason for the low Ca out put of my reactor when compared to the normal (reactor) Alk levels is because of Mg deficieny also..

Victor, I was looking at my epsom salts and I was going to use them but there are other compounds in them also that I don't want in my tank.. a proper *pure* buffer is only 9.00 for more than I will ever need so I figured what the heck.. also I wanted to order a couple books anyways hehe...

anyways my thinking might be on or off but it won't harm anything to slowly bring my levels up to *normal* and see... and sence it will be here in a couple days if it doesent start making a diff then I can look else whare.. as the Ca level should increase in proportion to the rise of the Mg level if that is the problem.

Steve

[titus]

Hello,

shouldent I just be increasing my co2 to get mode desolving? maby I am not understanding something here but if I increas both equaly then i just put more water of the same proportion don't I? <font size="2" face="Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif">I meant increase both but increase the CO2 more. Obviously if everything else are okay and your ca level is low in your effluent stream then that means you don't have enough CO2 to dissolve the media. The reason I asked you to try this route is because the media would release Mg as well.

What is your effluent pH BTW?

Titus

[Doug]

Steve, Your correct about the keeping magnesium levels around 1300ppm. Before my reactor, I used ESV brand.

My reactor had no problem keeping the magnesium levels at 1400ppm. Its a by-product of the media. I used only ARM.

Your effluent needs to have an alk. level close to 40dkh. Depending on the reactors efficiency, I ran mine at a fast drip,{almost steady stream} and about 60bbm.

[SuperFudge]

Originally posted by StirCrazy:


ok ow question I have about this.. Also for you Marc, if I increase both my feed rate and my co2 I stay the same. shouldent I just be increasing my co2 to get mode desolving? maby I am not understanding something here but if I increas both equaly then i just put more water of the same proportion don't I?

Steve<font size="2" face="Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif">Hi Steve,

If you just increase just your co2, this will tend to increase your alk only,and with an increase in alk comes a drop in Ca++,or atleast Ca++ will remain the same in the effluent.

If both are increased perportionatly,the increase in co2 seems to be counteracted by an equal increase in effluent rate.
I dont really understand the chemical reactions happening,but i know this to be true through the use of my reactors.

Your alk may slightly increase initially,but will level out....once you are close to the desired alk,then leave co2 alone and increase effluent only.

Like wise,if your effluent only is increased or high in comparison to your c02 rate your effluent would be higher in Ca++.

But if this is all thats done,you will end up with a higher Ca and a dropping alk,and if your alk is at the desired level now...it really isnt achieving the results you wish.

Im also pretty sure you have a low Mg level due to this reason aswell,the media in your reactor contains all the elements needed and should be very close to NSW when dissolved.kinda like a multivitamin ;)

This is why i had suggested waiting until your reactor was dialed in completely before additions of chemicals...dont panic,it usually takes alot longer than 2 weeks to get it finally reading what it should.

Keep in mind it is difficlult and unlikely wether you ever achieve Ca++ as NSW,while your alk sits as high as we usually like it to...3.5 and up.

But when your crunching #`s that close and you still have problems say,with sps growth,i would guess they have nothing to do with your reactor.

Hth,

[ 17 September 2002, 21:28: Message edited by: Superfudge ]

[StirCrazy]

hmmm ok, so it looks like I should have my reacctor Alk more than double what I want my tank alk.. so this makes sence it will desolve more stuff.. I also realize that I will get Mg from my media also, and I suspected that after everything is ballanced that it will take care of that also ( Now I know that, Thanks Doug)

and this is why I said in the begining that I was going to use the suplament to bring it up to whare it should be then i will probably never need it again. (mabe I didn't do a good job of stating this) i was thinking of using the reactor in over drive to do it but my thinking there was that might depress my PH more than I like with the increased co2.

so I was thinking along the lines that if I can get it up to 1200 ppm then the way my reactor is set right now should be able to handle it..

my low Ca out put from my reactor, I am thinking it is because of the low ca level in the tank water.. my idea is (tel me if this makes sence cuz if it doesen't then I have to look at it again hehe ) that in the amountof time the water is in the reactor for my feed rate and such it can only adsorb so much Ca, so if I have 200ppm water entering I have 330 ppm water exiting, so I am picking up 130 ppm in the reactor. my reasons for this line of though is that when my tank water was 180 ppm my reactor out put was 290. so going along that lines if I can get my Ca level in to the reactor at 380, then it should be 510 out with the same bubble rate. now this could be out to lunch also but so far it is working that way.. I also relize that I could increase my co2 and get more of a spread but when I started getting to the levels I need tomaintain I would have to reduce the co2 again. so sence I am putting in more Ca than I am consuming right now I thought I was set whare I wanted to be.. (this is based on my slow increase of Ca in the tank.)

anyways I am enjoying the sugestions and don't think I ignor them I am thinking them over and trying to rationalize them and when I make a post like this it is to show my thinking so others can show me whare I am thinking wrong or that maby I have a point..

Steve

[SuperFudge]

"and this is why I said in the begining that I was going to use the suplament to bring it up to whare it should be then i will probably never need it again."

Oh,ok.....to me though,thats like shopping for a new doorknob, when you havent purchased the house yet.

[ 16 September 2002, 07:58: Message edited by: Superfudge ]

[reefburnaby]

Hi,

If you are using ARM, which happens to be near 100% Aragonite, then you will get about...oh... < 5% magnesium. I would email Caribsea and see if they add magnesium in to their mix because Aragonite, as a rock, doesn't have much magnesium. Remember that Domolite discussion...Aragonite is better because it can't over dose Magnesium !

So, how long have you had this low calcium state ?

IMHO, I would try the magnesium theory on a small bucket of tank water before trying it in the system.

- Victor.

[StirCrazy]

ok the listings on my ARM aragonite are

Calcium 381,000ppm
Carbonate 590,000 ppm
Stronium 7,390 ppm
Magnesium 1,050 ppm
potassium 56ppm

so by looking at this if your levels are ballanced it should keep them ballanced.

well as long as everything desolves at the same rate...

Steve

[Aquattro]

My advice is still to run the reactor for a month before deciding you have a problem. You have a new tank, and this is normal for a new tank. You're using the same salt as 90% of this board; those with mature tanks don't have Ca levels of 200ppm AND they don't add Mg. Most don't even have a reactor. Leave it alone.

[ldzielak]

Steve,

I have to agree with Marc and Brad, I think you need to leave it all alone and wait for the tank to mature.
I had the exact same thing happen when I switched to my 120g last fall from my 33g. I think it has more to do with the "new" sand you have in your tank. This will buffer your system and your currently fighting this buffer system. I did the samething for 3 months with Kent Part A&B then with my reactor. Then after about 3-4 months everything fell right into line. I had the same normal alk but could not get the Ca++ up.

Just my thaughts.

Lee

[titus]

Hello,

Um.. the thread is picking up speed with many more people participating. Good.

Steve, I tried to read your last post but I'm kinda tired right now (9:45am on Monday and a problem I'm working on is giving me a headache. The monitor image is shaking!) so I didn't double read it.

But bottom line is this and I'm going to list in point form because it's easier for me to write:

1) Unless you are very experienced with "rapid deployment" of calcium reactors, with apriori knowledge of your tank water condition, it'd take (like Fudge and others said) a few weeks for it to dial in. This can be 4-6 weeks or more. If you are very good, however, it'd take days but still probably a week for things to balance out.

2) Good media like the ARM dissolves all needed nutrients in the proper balanced proportion like a multi-vitamin like Fudge said.

3) Good ca reactors would give you a high value of alk and ca in the effluent. How high? I can't even measure them with my test kits. That's how high and efficient it is.

4) Alk and Ca are like kids. You want harmony between them and it is up to you to do that. If one is bullying the other, then the other is in trouble.

5) Good ca reactor design = over engineering. How? A very large chamber. Why? Because a larger effluent rate doesn't affect the internal turnover rate much. This means the water circulating inside and through the media have enough time to dissolve it.

6) Increase in CO2 while maintaining same effluent means lower pH inside reactor and higher dissolving of media. Increase of effluent while maintaining same CO2 means less dissolving of media and higher pH at output. So you need to increase both in your case.

Titus

[ 16 September 2002, 10:06: Message edited by: Titus ]

[Doug]

FWIW, I always had trouble keeping my mag levels up, before a reactor. With it, they never went below 1350ppm. That must mean the ARM, supplies a sufficient amount of magnesium.

Steve, I would say the effluent alk. needs to be almost 3 times the tanks alk. My tank was always at 12dkh and my reactor effluent app. at 36dkh.

[ 16 September 2002, 10:09: Message edited by: Doug ]

[StirCrazy]

Ok, sence my suplement is being shipped and I had a few extra days to play and try some of your sugestions, I increased the bubble count on my reactor from 60 bpm to 90 bpm.
befor I di dthis increas my levels were

Tank
KH/Alk 10.7 dKH, Ca 210, Mg 860 ppm

effulent
KH/Alk 27 dKH, Ca 310

48 hours after increasing the co2

tank
KH/Alk 17.6 dKH, Ca 225, Mg 930 ppm, PH 7.9 (at night time)

effulent
KH/Alk 48 dKH, Ca 410, Mg 1050 ppm, PH 6.4

I am going to leave it like this for 2 more days and take another set of readings then, My only concern is the Alk reading of almost 18 dKH... is this a problem?

Steve

[DJ88]

Steve,

so it looks like I should have my reacctor Alk more than double what I want my tank alk.. <font size="2" face="Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif">That was what I told you a couple of weeks ago. I aim for at least 24 dKh out of my reactor. At the very least.

And as well you have to concider that once again, this is a new tank. Brand spanking new. As is the reefkeeping to you. Leave everything sit for at least a month.

With all the corals and fish you have added in such a short period of time your tank has not been able to stabilize on it's own. The more you mess with things such as reactors, inhabitants, lighting all in such a short periods of time and not lettign it to settle is not letting your tank find it's own balance.

Everyone is passing on advice that is wonderful But I honestly have to side with Marc, Brad and Lee. Your tank is young. Leave it be. Once it is stable(three months isn't stable with everything you have added) then start worrying about calcium levels and alkalinity.

I am a strong believer in a tank shouldn't be stocked full when it is brand new until at LEAST 6 months. No sooner. By the looks of your pics I see at least 10-12 fish and a sh!tload of corals. Soft and Hard. Keep changing the tanks parameters as you are trying to do right now and you are looking at a sure fire recipe for a huge crash. Your tank is unstable and not letting it find its stablity is going to make it more and more succeptible to one parameter suddenly going out of whack and making things much worse.

JMVHO

[ 17 September 2002, 19:18: Message edited by: DJ88 ]

[StirCrazy]

Originally posted by DJ88:
Steve,

I honestly have to side with Marc, Brad and Lee. JMVHO<font size="2" face="Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif">Um.. I took Marc's advice.. I increased my co2 and effulent rate.. and everything is still climbing.. So what I was getting at is that if my Alk is ok, I will not add anything as long as the Ca reactor is working.. which it apears to be doing.

I thought you said to set if for twice what I wanted for a alk, sorry if I misunderstod your meaning.. but now for my original question.. how much Alk is to much..??

somebody should sit down and write some generic steps for setting up a Ca reactor as it is hard to find anything to help you out.. sure you can find advice on what to set at but like I have gotten some people like it twice there tank alk and some people like it almost 4X there tank Alk, so it gets quite confusing, also some expected observations as to what to expect when you tweek this or tweek that would be cool. hmmm maby when I get this thing all figured out

Steve

[ 17 September 2002, 19:50: Message edited by: StirCrazy ]

[SuperFudge]

Are you sure your TANK alk is 18 DKH?...are you measuring near the effluent output ?

Well yes that is a problem....its too high!
Holy jeez 30bpm increase at once?
And no effluent increase (or no mention of amnt)?

I had suggested both of these perportionate to each other and to monitor it,more like 5 bpm and 5 dpm increase at a time,measure and adjust accordingly.

Whoooaaa gunshot approach! :eek:

You need only keep your TANK alk at slightly higher than normal,like say 3.6-4meq/l.....then raise JUST the effluent rate....test....if your calcium is not there yet,raise them both slowly and preportionatly.(increments as stated above) Test...if alk increased,then turn JUST effluent up more to counteract...leaving 24 hrs between adjustments and tests.
Repeat until params are met.

Weeks...not days.

[ 17 September 2002, 21:34: Message edited by: Superfudge ]

[Aquattro]

Gee Marc, ya think 18 dKh is too high :-)
That's double what my effluent was yesterday (whole other story). I think your phrase "not days, but weeks" should include that the number of weeks should equal up to a month. Just don't know what I'm gonna do with this Steve guy....... tongue.gif

[StirCrazy]

ya it is.. retested it.. I did raise them in proportion i increased the flow by 50% and I also increaed the co2 by 50% .. I just cut back on the co2 a bit.. it is about 70 bpm..

hmm
how do you count drips when it is almost a stream smile.gif

Thanks Marc

Steve

[ 17 September 2002, 21:30: Message edited by: StirCrazy ]

[SuperFudge]

Originally posted by StirCrazy:
ya it is.. retested it.. I did raise them in proportion i increased the flow by 50% and I also increaed the co2 by 50% .. I just cut back on the co2 a bit.. it is about 70 bpm..

hmm
how do you count drips when it is almost a stream smile.gif

Thanks Marc

Steve<font size="2" face="Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif">You get the stream when you increase things by 50 % ! :eek:

LOL,then take a small measuring cup and measure say in 5ml increments.

Your scarin me man!, id hate to see you when you get your hands on a bottle of magnesium! :eek:

[StirCrazy]

Originally posted by Superfudge:
QUOTE]You get the stream when you increase things by 50 % ! :eek:

LOL,then take a small measuring cup and measure say in 5ml increments.

Your scarin me man!, id hate to see you when you get your hands on a bottle of magnesium! :eek: [/QB]<font size="2" face="Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif">when I set it up I am getting a very fast drip at a flow rate of 1 gal/hour.. it ballanced out at 1.5 gph and when i increased the co2 I increased the flow to 2gph..

as it sits right now I am going to put the Mg on the shelf as the reactor is bringing my Ca, and my Mg levels up so I don't think I will have to use it.

Steve

[SuperFudge]

Originally posted by StirCrazy:
as it sits right now I am going to put the Mg on the shelf as the reactor is bringing my Ca, and my Mg levels up so I don't think I will have to use it.

Steve<font size="2" face="Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif">Thatll work better for ya,im sure.

I should also mention that "preportionate" might not be the proper term....i guess that might be taken as a ratio of 50:50.

It could be any ratio of effluent to bubble count increase.Like say for example from 40 bpm and 55mls min effluent to 45bpm and 58mls min effluent
I just meant to say that to give you a good work point,once the numbers you wish are very close you can tweak either one.Eventually doing it this way you can guess closely by just looking at or measuring either one of these seperatley, what the other is(or should be),and what any change of the same ratio will do for your system.

[ 17 September 2002, 22:10: Message edited by: Superfudge ]

[StirCrazy]

ok cool Marc, what kinda Ca level shoudl I expect to see in the effulent when it is working good?
some one said leaving the bubbles constant and increasing my effulant out willbring the Ca levels up? this still has me a little confused as I would have expected everything to drop if I increased the flow and not the co2..

Steve

[ 17 September 2002, 22:15: Message edited by: StirCrazy ]

[StirCrazy]

Ok this rears its ugly head again.. for three weeks I let stuff sit on the shelf and did more reaserch and tried the waiting game.. in that three weeks my MG cam up 20 ppm and my Ca came up 10 ppm. doing some more reading yesterday I decided to go ahead and raise my Mg and also my Ca to proper levels.

this is the reasioning behind my desision.
http://www.reefcentral.com/vbulletin/showthread.php?s=&threadid=119035

I started with my Mg yesterday, I raised it 100 ppm in 24 hours (max recomended on the bottle so it is probably a conservitave amount) and I took my Mg up to 990 ppm, my Ca increased 20 ppm ( to 245ppm ) as a result of the increase of Mg. I dosed another Mg tonight and I expect my level to be about 1100 tomorrow and I will test Ca to see if it jumps again with the increase.

once I get my Mg to 1300 (which I think will finnish this bottle) I will let it stabalize for a few days then increase the Ca to whare it should be.

I am writing all the measurments down and I will try to see if I can come up with any corralation between the Mg and Ca levels when I am done.

Steve