are calcium reactors outdated now?

[Randy Holmes-Farley Verified Community Expert]

Did you mean?
CO2 + H2O --> HCO3- + H2O

Carbonate buffers are consumed before the OH- ... correct?

Maybe this is what I am missing?

No, the reaction you wrote is incorrect. Charge and total atoms must match on both sides. Mine is correct.

yours would also suggest that adding CO2 increases alkalinity, which it cannot.

OH- is present at every pH. There is just steadily less and less as pH drops.

 

[HuduVudu]

No, the reaction you wrote is incorrect. Charge and total atoms must match on both sides. Mine is correct.

yours would also suggest that adding CO2 increases alkalinity, which it cannot.

OH- is present at every pH. There is just steadily less and less as pH drops.

I see what you are doing there. I thought it was series of partial equations.

Looks like you are showing three equations in parallel.

 

[Randy Holmes-Farley Verified Community Expert]

I see what you are doing there. I thought it was series of partial equations.

Looks like you are showing three equations in parallel.

yes, they are all happening at the same time

 

[HuduVudu]

the pH is unchanged unless you dissolved something that was a solid material before adding the CO2.

Ok, this.

In a CaRx. Can you ever bring the pH back to the original input pH?

 

[Randy Holmes-Farley Verified Community Expert]

Ok, this.

In a CaRx. Can you ever bring the pH back to the original input pH?

Yes, in fact you can bring it even higher if you can get it to full equilibrium with the same air because the alk is now higher.

But full equilibration of CO2 between water and air is harder than it may seem, hence the reason reef tanks even with lots of aeration show a daily pH cycle driven by in tank photosynthesis and respiration.

 

[acropora4u]

Started mine back up at 6.5ph pegged...i am using old stock of original reborn media:

 

[Breadman03]

I’m just using kalk at the moment, but a CR is ready to fire up when demand increases. I don’t want to wear out my stand mixer making 2-part!

 

[areefer01]

Mine is great and I never have issues with pH. Been using it for over 14years. Then again, I use gravity top off. Maybe I am just old.

Young. Not old.

Hope your day is going well!

 

[zheka757]

Being using mine for 2 years using reborn media, I thought I was good on ph until I recalibrate my probe and found out I'm at 7.7 on low side and 7.9 maxed. Freaked out when I saw that, I thought of using outside air for my skimmer, so for the test I grabbed half a gallon of tank water and put it outside with air pump running, only raised it from 7.9 to 8.0 so I don't know if putting skimmer inlet outside is worth it for me.
Any of you skimmer owners have advise for me.
....forgot to mention my reactor has about 20% of media left, I don't know if this will do anything as far as ph goes.
And my alk is at 7.5 range, and cal around 450.

 

[REAquatics]

Absolutely not man! Calcium Reactors have so many benefits, I am not sure they will ever go out of date. Then again, this hobby is always making huge strives to make Reef Keeping much easier now days.

Something I do to help with pH and calcium reactors. Firstly, I have high surface agitation which does help, but I also run a higher concentrate of dosage on my calcium reactor. I run my pH from 6.2-6.4 and dose less per min vs running 6.5-6.7. I still notice when the Calcium reactor is running that I do get a slight dip in pH, but we are talking .05 drop and nothing serious.

 

[Dburr1014]

Being using mine for 2 years using reborn media, I thought I was good on ph until I recalibrate my probe and found out I'm at 7.7 on low side and 7.9 maxed. Freaked out when I saw that, I thought of using outside air for my skimmer, so for the test I grabbed half a gallon of tank water and put it outside with air pump running, only raised it from 7.9 to 8.0 so I don't know if putting skimmer inlet outside is worth it for me.
Any of you skimmer owners have advise for me.
....forgot to mention my reactor has about 20% of media left, I don't know if this will do anything as far as ph goes.
And my alk is at 7.5 range, and cal around 450.

It should have gone up outside.
Are you sure it's calibrated correctly?

 

[Bpb]

Hello, with all the emphasis on higher PH , and calcium reactors (CR) often have a negative effect on PH, are CRs really needed any longer with all the dosing pump reef additives on the market that accomplish better results with higher PH to boot. Plus i have a kalk reactor now that i have been using , BUT, i also have a geo dual reactor, a carbon regulator and the Kamoer FX-STP2 WiFi Peristaltic Dosing Pump that I am not using at the moment, but dont know if i should use it as i don't want PH to lower... i am good with PH and alk currently

Disclaimer. I didn’t read the whole thread. And I realize I sound like an old man.

I think calcium reactors have fallen out of fashion because the main product pushers have likely deemed them to be not the greatest sellers. BRS tried years back, pushing the vertex reactor hard…but they’re a bit complicated to use, and are far from an out of the box working item, new and intermediate hobbyists just aren’t using them. Dosing is just such an easier and simpler sell. Calcium reactors are still a wonderful tool if you know how to use them.

 

[Toky916]

Disclaimer. I didn’t read the whole thread. And I realize I sound like an old man.

I think calcium reactors have fallen out of fashion because the main product pushers have likely deemed them to be not the greatest sellers. BRS tried years back, pushing the vertex reactor hard…but they’re a bit complicated to use, and are far from an out of the box working item, new and intermediate hobbyists just aren’t using them. Dosing is just such an easier and simpler sell. Calcium reactors are still a wonderful tool if you know how to use them.

This plus someone should just create a unit that's out of of the box that works. I think bill wann made one but took money and only a few ppl got one.

 

[Bpb]

This plus someone should just create a unit that's out of of the box that works. I think bill wann made one but took money and only a few ppl got one.

Bill wann made one yes. I never dealt with him personally but as I understand he was very hard to deal with, customer service wise. I tend to avoid buying gear from one man operations. The attention to detail you get makes you give up customer service standards and consistency/availability of product with a bigger brand. Personal opinion.

Dastaco and deltec each make one as well. And from what I hear they are fantastic units. They’re just not hyped by the bigger advertising giants to the same degree the Neptune trident is.

 

[jda]

I don't know how you could make a plug and play unit for everybody... just too many variables. Variable media size, variable tank pH which matters, variable pressure in the reactor which matters a bit, etc. It is true that you have to learn some things to be really good at using a CaRx, but it is not hard and once you get it, you get it forever. Even the saturation units don't work for all.

 

[costaricareef]

I love my CaRxs. Once set-up, the stability and simplicity is amazing. As several have said, you do have to learn a few things, but it's worth it. For bigger tanks for sure. 75-100gal may be around the boundary of when one is needed (depending on tank inhabitants and their needs of course).

 

[jmichaelh7]

I have had one started on my 190 gallon and the rest is history.

sometimes I use the soda ash from BRS just to supplement when I exchange co2 tanks at the store

not sure why but corals love the carx. My wife noticed that the corals aren’t as happy without it either. There was a period when my regulator went out and I went back to good old dosing.

no!! They are not old . They have some pretty nice ones out with reverse flow

 

[McPuff]

I ran a calcium reactor for nearly 10 years and actually just switched back to dosing. The reactor generally had no issues keeping pace with demand but I could never get the pH in my reef high enough. Tried several things but since the tank and sump are in the basement I'm already at a disadvantage. Tank is now running with GHL and director/dosing pumps. I really do like the CARX method quite a bit but made the switch and I'll see how it plays out.

 

[Gungo]

I've always used two-part or kalk but with my new build I decided to try the CaRx and I couldn't be happier. Running since August 2021 and rock-solid parameters. Never had an issue with PH. I don't think low ph has anything to do with CaRx btw. I'm not using any PH booster.

 

[dieselkeeper]

I always used a calcium reactor for over 15 years. Installing a second chamber helped with PH. Even before the second chamber, I never experienced anything bad with 7.8 ph