Alkalinity consumption rate

[asylumdown]

Also, I've been very concerned about the possibility of precipitation. But there's none. Not on any pumps, heaters, nothing. The amount in dosing right now can barely keep my dKH over 7 and my calcium hovering in the 390s, neither level is high enough to indicate precipitation could be occurring

[TimT]

Originally Posted by Aquattro

Tim, I emptied a 20# bottle in 24 hours in my livingroom. Nobody died

But did they get a buzz?

[Myka]

I think it's kind of funny (cute?) when people start dosing, and they say "I dose more and more and I can't keep up." Just keep dosing more. As your parameters stabilize the growth will increase too, so then you'll be behind again. By now you should have a good idea how much you increase the dosing and how much that affects your numbers. Just keeping increasing until you find the happy spot, but continue weekly testing until your tank is full (of corals) and the increase in consumption is less. A growing tank will always have a greater and greater demand until you're fragging just as much as is growing. I can't remember if you mentioned magnesium at all? You're testing that as well, right? You're in the 1300-1400 ppm range?

Originally Posted by TimT

That might be because either your trying to mix too much bicarb into the amount of water or the water is cooling too much after dissolving and the bicarb won't stay in solution. I find it works better if you warm the water to about 80°f. I mix at a concentration of 86 grams sodium bicarb to 1 litre of water. I stir it for 15 minutes to make sure it's all dissolved.

I do this too, except I use a MJ400 to do the mixing. Using warm water makes a big difference when mixing sodium (bi)carbonate.

[Snappy]

Regarding any precipitate at the bottom of the container - I do get some but I really don't worry about it. I draw the solution through an air stone so I don't clog up my hoses or pumps. I also run a small powerhead in the alk tank to help things stay in solution.

[Myka]

That's interesting about the precipitate from the alkalinity solution. I don't get any precipitate from either Fauna Marin or Tropic Marin. TM mixes a lot easier than FM for some reason, but they both dissolve completely.

[reefwars]

i mix alk in about as hot water as i can get and i mix calcium in about as cold water as i can get lol :P

[asylumdown]

I've been testing my alk daily, my calcium every few days and magnesium once ever 7-10ish days. More because of the time it takes to do each test than anything.

Magnesium has been steady at 3x calcium, which since calcium has been low has been in the mid 1200s for a while, I'll do some more rigorous testing this weekend and make sure they're all still in balance. I've been using part C from Tropic Marin's system as well, I suppose your'e supposed to dose an equal amount of part C as parts A and B, but even with barely dosing my magnesium doesn't change much, so I'm not sure if I'm ready to do that.

well after dosing 780mL/day of Parts A & B my dKH only fell by 0.3 in 24 hours, so I'm getting there. Just re-adjusted manually and upped the dosing rate by another 120 mL/day.

gah. I want a calcium reactor!

[asylumdown]

WOOHOO! 900mL/day is the sweet spot. dKH up 0.06, which considering the margin of error on the hanna checker and the slight variances expected measuring 10 mL of solution and 1mL of reagent without a micro-pipette, it's basically the same as yesterday.

[Wretch]

Originally Posted by asylumdown

WOOHOO! 900mL/day is the sweet spot. dKH up 0.06, which considering the margin of error on the hanna checker and the slight variances expected measuring 10 mL of solution and 1mL of reagent without a micro-pipette, it's basically the same as yesterday.

Damn. Is that normal for a tank that size? I think I need more coral. I only use 12ml a day.

[gregzz4]

I wonder how many mls/day you'd be using if you were running 2-part ?

I'm currently using 100mls/day of alk in my 75g with a less than medium stocked level of SPS