Can someone explain Alkalinity?

DraggingTail · Jan 13, 2019

Cloudy right now I just dosed

Brew12 · Jan 14, 2019

DraggingTail said:
Cloudy right now I just dosed

What are you dosing that is causing your tank to go cloudy?

DraggingTail · Jan 14, 2019

Brew12 said:
What are you dosing that is causing your tank to go cloudy?

To keep my Calcium at 420 I add 15ml of Kent Purple Tech each night.

Retro Reefer · Jan 14, 2019

The biggest thing with Alk is keeping it stable, pick a number 7.5-9.5 and try to keep it there.. IMO your problem with sps is your tank is not mature enough, ideally you will have abundant Coraline growth before adding your first sticks.

Brew12 · Jan 14, 2019

DraggingTail said:
To keep my Calcium at 420 I add 15ml of Kent Purple Tech each night.

That explains the cloudiness but I am surprised you have that much coral growth that you need to use that much. If you don't add it for a day, how much does your calcium drop?

DraggingTail · Jan 14, 2019

Brew12 said:
That explains the cloudiness but I am surprised you have that much coral growth that you need to use that much. If you don't add it for a day, how much does your calcium drop?

I test every week. It just keeps it stable. I think the big consumer is green Calcareous and corraline. Should only be adding approx 6ppm a day

Here is my log.

https://docs.google.com/spreadsheet...RdChcCXN_XPrurixjkQD8e_pVVA/edit?usp=drivesdk

DraggingTail · Jan 14, 2019

Retro Reefer said:
The biggest thing with Alk is keeping it stable, pick a number 7.5-9.5 and try to keep it there.. IMO your problem with sps is your tank is not mature enough, ideally you will have abundant Coraline growth before adding your first sticks.

I have corraline I scrape off glass, growing all over my plastic and spots all over my rock that are spreading nicely. That doesn't count the green Calcareous. I did not add any coral until both were growing everywhere.

Brew12 · Jan 14, 2019

DraggingTail said:
I test every week. It just keeps it stable. I think the big consumer is green Calcareous and corraline. Should only be adding approx 6ppm a day

Here is my log.

https://docs.google.com/spreadsheet...RdChcCXN_XPrurixjkQD8e_pVVA/edit?usp=drivesdk

When is the last time you stopped dosing to see how much it would drop without using it?

And what is your system volume?

DraggingTail · Jan 14, 2019

Brew12 said:
When is the last time you stopped dosing to see how much it would drop without using it?

And what is your system volume?

Yes, if I get lazy it will drop to 400. I while back I made limewater to top off with and dosed purple tech at the same time. That is where the 480 in the log came from.

With sump 80 gallon..

Brew12 · Jan 14, 2019

DraggingTail said:
Yes, if I get lazy it will drop to 400. I while back I made limewater to top off with and dosed purple tech at the same time. That is where the 480 in the log came from.

With sump 80 gallon..

Great, we can do a quick check on that. According to Kent "When added at a rate of 1 mL per gallon of purified water, Kent Marine Purple Tech will increase the concentration of calcium by 26 ppm."

Since you add 15mL per 80g it should replace around 5ppm of calcium each day. That seems pretty reasonable.

Lighting could be an issue. It would be nice to check with a PAR meter but a LUX meter can help in a pinch. Do you have them in a high flow area?

DraggingTail · Jan 14, 2019

Brew12 said:
Great, we can do a quick check on that. According to Kent "When added at a rate of 1 mL per gallon of purified water, Kent Marine Purple Tech will increase the concentration of calcium by 26 ppm."

Since you add 15mL per 80g it should replace around 5ppm of calcium each day. That seems pretty reasonable.

Lighting could be an issue. It would be nice to check with a PAR meter but a LUX meter can help in a pinch. Do you have them in a high flow area?

Flow.... They are on the other side.

Here is my lighting. 400w 20000k radium MH.

saltyfilmfolks · Jan 14, 2019

DraggingTail said:
I notice your light is WAY above your water. My bulb is only 8" off the water and it's a 400w 20000k MH on 10 hours a day.

Could I be burning them up?

That milli is only a couple inches below the surface

It would have gone white.
Yea, you could shorten the the time it’s in for sure.
With your set up I’d consider an led strip. Use the strip for viewing and MH for growig. Like the MH @hrs. Etc.

saltyfilmfolks · Jan 14, 2019

A stupid cheap fun addicting test would be to find a green slimer acro or frogskin. Two bullet proof species and see waht happens.

DraggingTail · Jan 14, 2019

saltyfilmfolks said:
It would have gone white.
Yea, you could shorten the the time it’s in for sure.
With your set up I’d consider an led strip. Use the strip for viewing and MH for growig. Like the MH @hrs. Etc.

Blue LEDs come on at 7am. MH comes on at 8am. MH shuts off at 6pm. LEDs shut off at 10pm.

nereefpat · Jan 14, 2019

DraggingTail said:
I don't completely understand Alkalinity. Can some master reefers explain the difference between Alkalinity and dKH? How you test for them and how Ca and Mg play a role in the reef ecosystem?

Alkalinity is the measure of how water can resist downward changes in pH. dKH (German: degrees Karbonate Hardness) is carbonate hardness.

Carbonate hardness (German KH) in a reef tank, for our intents and purposes, is the same as alkalinity. In a reef tank, an alk kit and a dkH kit will be the same and interchangeable.