Alk mess up

hkgar · Jun 17, 2018

After 17 years maybe I should post this in the Newbie forum.
The good part is my tank uses 3 dKH/day so the problem will self correct in just over a day, but probably not without some SPS coral damage.

My CA reactor broke so I set up a batch of Randy's ALK part 2 to be administered to the tank by one of my DOS pumps that I have been using for AWC.

I correctly shut off the pump that removed the old salt water and adjusted the flow from 9090 ml/day to 310 ml/day for the part 2 solution.

But- I closed Apex without saving the change, change made at about 10:30 this morning. At 4:00 PM I checked alk with hanna - 228 PPM (12.8+ dKH)

Reeferdood · Jun 17, 2018

Ouch,
I assume you shut the dos off? IMHO, I would do a few smaller water changes to bring it into your happy range down slowly.
How does the livestock look??

RussC · Jun 17, 2018

In the same boat. Spiked my DKH 4 points in three hours because of an APEX programming error I made. So glad I caught it. But have been in scramble mode since Friday.

My tank averages about 8 DKH. I do 20 gallon water changes every two weeks. My new water has a DKH reading about 11-11.4. So when I spiked, I did two 20 gallon changes in two days. And now the DKH is at 11, down about 1.3 DKH. So now I'm looking for another way to keep it dropping.

So I tried mixing a little Muriatic acid in my new water to lower the DKH. It worked. Been messing with about 10 gallons. Got DKH to 8.3 and am now running an air stone to help eliminate the CO2. Have no idea how long to run the air stone. Have no idea if making this 10 gallons water change will even make a difference. Figured I'd start small and go from there.

Tank is looking fine. Not really noticed any significant, visible impact. Worried to death, though.

hkgar · Jun 17, 2018

Reeferdood said:
Ouch,
I assume you shut the dos off? IMHO, I would do a few smaller water changes to bring it into your happy range down slowly.
How does the livestock look??

yup, shut down DOS. Won't do water changes. If you figure the percentages, water changes don't do much

hkgar · Jun 17, 2018

RussC said:
My tank averages about 8 DKH.

Per day? How big is the DT?

Reeferdood · Jun 17, 2018

hkgar said:
yup, shut down DOS. Won't do water changes. If you figure the percentages, water changes don't do much

How are the corals responding?

RussC · Jun 17, 2018

I have a DT if 80 gallons

jml1149 · Jun 17, 2018

For an ALK OD I would recommend turning down the lights. Dana Riddle did a study or presentation at MACNA about the correlation between ALK and photosynthesis. The conclusion, somewhere, was that too much Oxygen can be harmful.

I've OD'd on alk before, turning down the lights immediately on discovery seemed to help. Certainly cant hurt.

Randy Holmes-Farley · Jun 18, 2018

hkgar said:
After 17 years maybe I should post this in the Newbie forum.
The good part is my tank uses 3 dKH/day so the problem will self correct in just over a day, but probably not without some SPS coral damage.

My CA reactor broke so I set up a batch of Randy's ALK part 2 to be administered to the tank by one of my DOS pumps that I have been using for AWC.

I correctly shut off the pump that removed the old salt water and adjusted the flow from 9090 ml/day to 310 ml/day for the part 2 solution.

But- I closed Apex without saving the change, change made at about 10:30 this morning. At 4:00 PM I checked alk with hanna - 228 PPM (12.8+ dKH)

I wouldn't do anything special if it will drop that fast anyway.

RussC · Jun 18, 2018

"For an ALK OD I would recommend turning down the lights"

That' get's me thinking. Isn't Photosynthesis what uses the alkalinity (in so many words)? Following that understanding, then wouldn't turning down the lights slow down photosynthesis, thus slowing down the consumption of ALK?

What was the cliff notes version of the correlation Dana Riddle discussed?