ATO with Kalk, cal, mag

[1979fishgeek]

Hi guys

I loose about the same amont through evaporation every day about 12l in a 850l system. I have a mixed reef dominated by Zoa, monti, easy sps and a few lps (torch, hammer, frogspawn).

I need to dose a lot of calcium and magnesium weekly and I have been persistently having issues with low KH. My Coraline algae has stsrted going white, nothing else looks unhappy but it's a indication of a issue, I think it's the constant KH/Alk dropping low (KH/Alk 5.4/1.93) and high calcium and magnesium uptake by growing sps and lps. (Correct me if wrong assumption!)

I have a ATO, if I work out the weekly amont I am dosing of each and divide by 7 days to get a rough amont the system uses daily and add it to the corresponding amont of RO in the ATO resivoir can I add Kalk, cal and mag directly to the top off RO I use? Or am I better just putting Kalkwasser in the ATO RO and getting auto dosing for Calcium and Magnesium?

 

[thewbell]

I do not believe you can mix the calcium and alkalinity supplements but I think you can mix mag with one of them. Depending on how much calcium and alkalinity demand you have you may be able to get away with kalkwasser in the ATO as this is the only easy way I know of to dose the two together (other than a calcium reactor). I forget what the ratios are but in one of the articles written by Randy Holmes-Farley he goes over the max additions possible using saturated kalkwasser. You can always add additional calcium either manually or with a dosing pump if the kalkwasser doesn't match up with your tanks consumption of calcium and alkalinity like you mentioned.

 

[Salty1962]

You don't need to mix Alk and CA together, you should dose them separately. I use BRS and dose with a autmatic doser. I add Mg manually as my system doesn't use it as quickly.

 

[1979fishgeek]

Thanks guys, I always seem to have a issue keeping my Alk stable, I like to test Alk, Calc and Mag weekly to every few days and my Calc and Mag do drop but are easy to correct, the Alk however is becoming a pain.

Tested 30 mins ago using Seachem
KH/Alk 6.4/2.29
Cal 425
Magnesium 1485

Would it be a safe then to put a Kalkwasser solution in my ATO and get dosing pumps for calcium and magnesium?

Reading as much as I can, but its one of those topics which the more I read the less I realise I understood....if that makes sense!

Been using Reeflowers solutions but going through bottles of their KH which is why I am thinking might be better going back to using a straight forward Kalkwasser solution.

 

[1979fishgeek]

Just to add...

Only been keeping sps and lps few months and been getting great growth, once stoney corals start get going is Kalkwasser and cal/mag auto dosing the most efficient way to keep the system stable?

Few pics of some of my sps/lps all frags from fellow enthusiasts and my pride and joy!

 

[tcoyle]

if use Kalk in your ATO, it will supply equal amounts of Alk and Calcium. What you need to do is make a one time correction to you your ALK to get it to where you want it to be. If its more then 1dk I would spread it over a few days to bring it up slowly. Then see if just running Kalk in your ATO will keep up with the demand. If you end up maxing out on Kalk, then you might want to add a balanced 2 part approach. But remember always add BOTH ALK and Calcium, but not at the same time. If your just adding one part of the 2 part system, then you will cause the other to go out of wack. Look at the stickies that Randy has set up on how to correct imbalances and dosing 2 part.

 

[1979fishgeek]

Thanks tcoyle really appreciate that, first thing I have read that made sense. Cheers!

 

[Randy Holmes-Farley Verified Community Expert]

FWIW, you cannot add calcium or alkalinity or magnesium to an ATO that contains limewater (kalkwasser).

 

[1979fishgeek]

Can you tell yet I was rubbish at chemistry?!

Thanks guys really mean that, you just saved me a fortune and probably saved my coral collection too.

So.....plan is get everything where it needs to be with regards to Alk, Cal, Mag. Then start adding Kalkwasser to ATO and then test, test, test record everything them post it on here so you guys can tell me what to do next. Lol

THANK YOU

 

[Randy Holmes-Farley Verified Community Expert]

Sounds good.

Happy Reefing.