Confused - BRS video

[Wes Allsbrook]

Just watched a BRS video explaining problems with traditional two part dosing and the balling method.

Will my regular water changes not help replenish trace elements? Currently dosing soda ash for alkalinity since that is the only thing being depleted. If not, can I do Tropic Marine All For Reef? Wouldn’t that mean my calcium and mag levels would increase unnecessarily?

 

[EeyoreIsMySpiritAnimal]

Just watched a BRS video explaining problems with traditional two part dosing and the balling method.

Will my regular water changes not help replenish trace elements? Currently dosing soda ash for alkalinity since that is the only thing being depleted. If not, can I do Tropic Marine All For Reef? Wouldn’t that mean my calcium and mag levels would increase unnecessarily?

Most hobbyists don't need to dose. If you have a large amount of SPS you are more likely to need to supplement your system. Alkalinity is the only one of the big 3 that I ever need to add to my predominantly LPS 90 gallon reef, and generally only when I don't do weekly water changes.
So yes, water changes can definitely be all you need for most elements (that's why the salt is so expensive, lol). And yes, you may only need to dose Alk, depending on what corals you have.

 

[Reef.]

Just watched a BRS video explaining problems with traditional two part dosing and the balling method.

Will my regular water changes not help replenish trace elements? Currently dosing soda ash for alkalinity since that is the only thing being depleted. If not, can I do Tropic Marine All For Reef? Wouldn’t that mean my calcium and mag levels would increase unnecessarily?

as I understand it, if alk if being used so is calcium at roughly the same amount, mag less so, but still being used.

You can just buy trace elements to add, water changes will replace some elements, you could send your water away to get tests to see if that is keeping up, or if you need to dose to replace some elements that may be missing or low.

AFR has alk, mag and calcium and also trace elements, depending on the tank size, it’s a good option.

 

[Wes Allsbrook]

as I understand it, if alk if being used so is calcium and roughly the same amount, mag less so.

You can just buy trace elements to add, water changes will replace some elements, you could send your water away to get tests to see if that is keeping up, or if you need to dose to replace some elements that may be missing or low.

AFR has alk, mag and calcium and also trace elements, depending on the tank size, it’s a good option.

I have been testing calcium and magnesium as well and they are staying pretty stable. Alkalinity is the only thing dropping. This is assuming I am testing correctly.

 

[EeyoreIsMySpiritAnimal]

I have been testing calcium and magnesium as well and they are staying pretty stable. Alkalinity is the only thing dropping. This is assuming I am testing correctly.

My tank does the same thing. How stable is your pH?

 

[HudsonReefer2.0]

My system goes through more alk then calcium and magnesium. I top off w kalk and test alk daily. Hanna.

 

[Wes Allsbrook]

My tank does the same thing. How stable is your pH?

Im ashamed to say I haven’t tested ph. I have been dosing small amount of soda ash throughout the day with a doser to avoid a spike in ph.

 

[Reef.]

I have been testing calcium and magnesium as well and they are staying pretty stable. Alkalinity is the only thing dropping. This is assuming I am testing correctly.

Calcium and mag tests are not great, with testing errors you could miss a drop, mag is the least used so a test may not pick it up on a daily/weekly basis, calcium too, you are only looking at a small change. As said erynunlikey for you to be only using alk.

 

[EeyoreIsMySpiritAnimal]

Im ashamed to say I haven’t tested ph. I have been dosing small amount of soda ash throughout the day with a doser to avoid a spike in ph.

That's ok. Do you test your Alk at different times of the day?

 

[HudsonReefer2.0]

My system goes through more alk then calcium and magnesium. I top off w kalk and test alk daily. Hanna.

Esv 2 part. Has trace elements

 

[Wes Allsbrook]

That's ok. Do you test your Alk at different times of the day?

I have been testing every day at around the same time if day.

 

[Wes Allsbrook]

Calcium and mag tests are not great, with testing errors you could miss a drop, mag is the least used so a test may not pick it up on a daily/weekly basis, calcium too, you are only looking at a small change. As said erynunlikey for you to be only using alk.

You are probably right. I’m just relaying what my Red Sea kit is telling me.

 

[Luis's Nano]

I just watched the brs video as well. Glad I found this thread. So out of curiosity, if I switch my 2 part with Tropic Marins all in one powder. Will i have to do water changes? If my nitrates and phosphates are fine. The dosing of the tropic marin powder should maintain everything else right?

 

[HuduVudu]

Just watched a BRS video explaining problems with traditional two part dosing and the balling method.

Will my regular water changes not help replenish trace elements? Currently dosing soda ash for alkalinity since that is the only thing being depleted. If not, can I do Tropic Marine All For Reef? Wouldn’t that mean my calcium and mag levels would increase unnecessarily?

Many many many people do NOT understand what it is that they are doing when they "dose".

If you are using two part you are dosing Calcium Chloride and Sodium BiCarbonate. You are NOT dosing Calcium or Carbonate. Dosing these two things will change the balance of sodium and chloride in your tank. You can NOT test for sodium or chloride unless you get an ICP. The amount of contribution to sodium and chloride is small percentage wise but over time ther comes a point which is unknow that the sodium chloride will come out of balance. It is also not known what the imbalance will cause. Do you want to try to trouble shoot the problems that arise from this? There is another problem with this in that the two part can cause the sodium and chloride to come out of balance with the rest of the elements in the salt water. Enter Balling. This three part dosing ensures that everything goes up. This will require dilution.

All of this is great in theory but reality makes things messier and harder to do this. That is why water changes are highly recommended in these systems. People don't know and don't understand how important the water changes are to rebalancing these systems.

The All in Ones are better but the alk comes from biological breakdown and may not be seen right away and will be therefore difficult to relate directly to the calcium.

Please educate yourself about dosing. It isn't simple and the consquences can be very serious.

 

[Shirak]

Just watched a BRS video explaining problems with traditional two part dosing and the balling method.

Will my regular water changes not help replenish trace elements? Currently dosing soda ash for alkalinity since that is the only thing being depleted. If not, can I do Tropic Marine All For Reef? Wouldn’t that mean my calcium and mag levels would increase unnecessarily?

If it's the video I am thinking of it's more about addressing the potential imbalance between sodium and chloride which will build up over time if you are just adding sodium carbonate/bicarbonate and not using a balanced 2 part.

The balling method or a balanced 2 part will address this by adding chloride usually from calcium chloride in a certain proportion to balance the sodium from the Alk portion.

Water changes will slow the imbalance greatly.

Really depends on what you dose and how much...and how often and to what extent you do water changes.

 

[HudsonReefer2.0]

 

[A_Blind_Reefer]

I love brs but sometimes they put stuff out as gospel a little too soon. I do have to say that I’m thankful they corrected themselves in the most recent video this time around. However, this isn’t new and they whiffed on this before. I fell for it about two years ago when Ryan recommended TM Part C mixed as 7.5 scoops to one gallon of rodi to be dosed at the same rate as your Alk to “replenish” trace elements. Six months in and my ICP came back very low on a lot of trace elements. Randy here set me straight, thanks Randy. They later changed from 7.5 scoops per gallon to 4.5 (I think) but never came out and retracted the whole trace element thing. Now they have you add TM A and K. I have learned to let the dust settle a bit before you jump in on the latest hype. Don’t get me wrong, Ryan and BRS are awesome and have provided a ton of valuable info for us. He always says trailblazers are the first to get shot in the back. He also says he wouldn’t put anything in his tank that you can’t test for but for some reason a lot of videos are telling us to put stuff in our tanks we can’t really test for. Go figure.

 

[Coolcasino]

Esv 2 part. Has trace elements

Im sorry. I dont believe it does.

 

[Randy Holmes-Farley Verified Community Expert]

Just watched a BRS video explaining problems with traditional two part dosing and the balling method.

Will my regular water changes not help replenish trace elements? Currently dosing soda ash for alkalinity since that is the only thing being depleted. If not, can I do Tropic Marine All For Reef? Wouldn’t that mean my calcium and mag levels would increase unnecessarily?

I do not watch BRS videos, but I can details exactly what the two different issues are here.

1. When you dose calcium chloride and sodium bicarbonate/carbonate/hydroxide for calcium and alk, there is a residue of sodium and chloride that accumulates. That slowly raises salintiy, and when a reefer maintains salinity by rwducing it a bit, everything in the water gets pushed down. That includes major ions such as potassium and sulfate, minor ions like fluoride, and trace elements such as iron and manganese.

There are several possible ways to deal with that decline.

A. Put all of those other ions into one of the two parts. Products like ESV B-ionic do that.
B. Put all of those ions into a third part. Products like Balling Part C do that.
C. Put some of the most important (but not all) of those ions into a third part . My third part does that for magnesium and sulfate.
D. Rely on water changes to keep elements from drifting too much from this effect. It works, but is not as effective as A-C.

2. The second issue is how to replace elements lost to consumption that is unrelated to the use of the two part, and is driven by other processes, such as precipitation, element uptake by organisms, removal by media or skimmers, etc.

Again, there are several ways to deal with that decline:

A. Put some of those depleted ions into the into one of the two parts of a two part. A variety of commercial two parts make this claim (not ESV).
B. Put some of those depleted ions a third part. Products like AF mineral salt may claim to do this. Balling Part C does not.
C. Put some of the most important (but not all) of those ions into a third part . My third part does that for real depletion of magnesium.
D. Rely on food additions and water changes to keep elements from drifting too much from this effect. It works, but is not as chemically complete as A-C or E below.
E. Dose one or more element supplements to replace what is consumed. Note that the recipe for 2E must be very different than the recipe for issues relating to part 1.

 

[Randy Holmes-Farley Verified Community Expert]

Im sorry. I dont believe it does.

It does, but only to deal with Type 1 issues I describe above, and not Type 2 issues also described above.