Dosing Sodium Silicate 40% Solution for Dino, seeking help with dosing schedule.

[Orion9]

Good morning,
I've been fighting dinos for a while and ordered a bottle of 40% silicate solution but struggling to determine how much and how often to dose. My research so far suggested 2.5ml mixed with ~300ml of RO for 265 gallon system. I've treated once so far, overnight using a DOS, but unsure if I should repeat daily, weekly, or just once.
Thanks!

 

[Formulator]

40% = 400,000 ppm. I’ve heard a good target silicate concentration of 0.5 ppm. Assuming you are starting with zero silicate, this would equate to a dose of 0.004 mL per gallon of system volume. For a 100 gallon tank, that is only 0.4 mL. 2.5 mL of the 40% solution is quite a bit of silicate to dose in one go, unless you have a pretty large tank. What is the tank volume?

In general, you need to test silicate, figure out the consumption in your tank and then calculate a daily or weekly dosing schedule to maintain your target. I’ve heard target recommendations of 0.2 ppm all the way up to 1 ppm. I suggest researching that first and deciding who’s recommendation you want to go with. I think our resident chemistry expert, @Randy Holmes-Farley recommends 0.2 ppm, but I’m not sure if that stands for dino treatment or just in general as there are benefits to dosing silicate in most tanks, regardless of any dino outbreak.

 

[Orion9]

Thanks for your response and the detailed information. The tank is 265 gallons and I do need to purchase a test kit. Have you used, or would you recommend the Hanna low range test kit?

 

[Formulator]

Thanks for your response and the detailed information. The tank is 265 gallons and I do need to purchase a test kit. Have you used, or would you recommend the Hanna low range test kit?

I have not used the hannah test kit, but it was recommended to me by others with experience after I found the salifert test does not work and seems to show zero for everyone. I was told the hannah kit and seachem kit both work, but the hannah has better precision. I ended up going with the seachem kit since I don’t need extreme precision with silicate measurements and I’m fine with just being able to discern approximately 0, 0.5, and 1.0 ppm. Its also a fair bit cheaper.

 

[taricha]

I’ve heard target recommendations of 0.2 ppm all the way up to 1 ppm. I suggest researching that first and deciding who’s recommendation you want to go with. I think our resident chemistry expert, @Randy Holmes-Farley recommends 0.2 ppm, but I’m not sure if that stands for dino treatment or just in general as there are benefits to dosing silicate in most tanks, regardless of any dino outbreak.

Randy's suggested dosing was not made in the context of dinos, but it's a perfectly good recommended amount to grow diatoms and so works fine as a target for getting diatoms to outcompete dinos.