ATO question?

[rubin88]

Has anyone use or hard of adding pickling lime in ato water to keep alk up?

 

[redfishbluefish]

Yep! Once you mix it, it's called Kalkwasser. And Mrs. Wages can be found at Walmart.

You'll most likely be able to get 1 tablespoon per gallon dissolved, but anything over that might require acid addition. I'd start with 1 tablespoon per gallon and see what that does to you alk and calc numbers.

 

[rubin88]

Yes I well try it because my alk is all ways low.

 

[redfishbluefish]

Note that with a new tank with a few frags, you can get away with dosing by using lime in the ATO. Eventually, as the hard corals grow, the ATO method won't be able to keep up and you'll need to consider alternate means.

 

[rubin88]

That sounds good to hear cause at the moment I have no corals but my tank is not a new tank.

 

[Flippers4pups]

I add calcium hydroxide (Mrs. Wages, pickling lime) into my ATO top off tank. Not so much for alkalinity, but for CA. I would suggest dosing sodium bicarbonate (baking soda, not baking powder!) to raise and maintain your alkalinity

1 1/8 cup of sodium bicarbonate into a gallon of RO/DI water. Mix till clear/disolved and dose using this calculator :

http://reef.diesyst.com/chemcalc/chemcalc.html

Use Randy's part 2.

Between 7-11 DKH is acceptable.

Happy reefing

 

[cracker]

dosing Lime water works for me.I started this a couple of months ago. Now I'm not the expert on this at all.However I found i

 

[77railer]

We do the same with Kalkwasser but atm we are dosing 1 teaspoon to every 2 gallons. To each their own

 

[shred5]

Be carefull with pickling lime/calcium hydroxide/kalk it has a very high ph and increases ph so keep an eye on it.