Dosing Vinegar?

Usctom · Jan 21, 2014

jg93 said:
Could you tell me how much Kalk/Vinegar you put in per gallon in your ATO? Thanks!

3 Teaspoons of kalk/ 30ml of vinegar per gallon.

Mike J. · Jan 21, 2014

I use 2 teaspoons kalk and 5 ml vinegar per gallon in an ATO.

J062682l · Jan 22, 2014

Will vodka or vinegar help drop phosphates.

silent_circle · Jan 22, 2014

Yes. It will drop nitrates and phosphates

NC2WA · Jan 23, 2014

but it will also increase pH, so you need to test/watch it

revhtree · Jan 23, 2014

I will be adding vinegar to my top off water soon! Need to figure out a good amount first. What do you suggest per 5 gallons of water to start?

Mike J. · Jan 23, 2014

Starting out I'd suggest only 5ml per gallon. As I'm sure you are aware, change should be done gradually.

reefbroke · Jan 31, 2014

NC2WA said:
but it will also increase pH, so you need to test/watch it

I thought it would DECREASE ph?

Gauge · Jan 31, 2014

Yes It will decrease pH, it is an acid and will therefore make your pH more acidic.

mcarroll · Jan 31, 2014

Depends how much Ca+alkalinity usage you are seeing in your tank after testing. Checking the Reef Chemistry Calculator is a great way to calculate your necessary dose - it has an option for limewater.

Example:

If you figure you're losing 15 ppm of calcium per week (420 ppm target, tested after a week at 405 ppm), and your system was 100 gallons, you'd find that 1.8 gallons of limewater per week would be required. More than this and you'd be overdosing.

And remember it should only take about 6-7 grams of lime to make a gallon of saturated limewater.

As for dosing vinegar with it, this is a must-read.

Key quote:

[...]the "stoichiometric" amount of Vinegar[...]that provides the exact equivalent of enough CO2 to react all the Kalk powder to Calcium and Bicarbonate, turns out to be about 25ml of 5% Acetic Acid per liter of saturated (0.02 moles/liter or 1.5 grams/liter) aqueous Calcium Hydroxide solution (Kalkwasser). I've used 30ml of Vinegar to a Â½ teaspoon of Ca(OH)2 per liter of mix without any problem, but recommend about 15ml to those new to using Vinegar. This means that you still need to go easy on the stirring, because we are not providing quite enough equivalent CO2 to avoid SOME Carbonate ion formation if we get carried away with the mixing.

Personally, my tank was already very high demand when I started and I began with the "correct" amount (~100mL vinegar/5 gallons of ATO reservoir) and was fine. Taking their more-conservative advice might not be a bad idea though. If you don't have a lime reactor, premixing the vinegar and lime powder directly is the way to go vs mixing the lime with the reservoir water first....as indicated in the link.

And FWIW, before vinegar I measured about 100 ppm of calcium in my top-off reactor output....after vinegar I measured about 200 ppm. It's not unreasonable to expect double the mineral output, but check it.

Keep us posted!

-Matt

P.S. If you're doing it right, this should have no immediate impact on pH if you don't want it to. You're prolly over-dosing vinegar if you're seeing a negative impact on pH. Under-dosing vinegar if you're still seeing a boost in pH. Calcium acetate (the product of lime+vinegar) is neutral....which is really the whole idea behind doing lime this way. It's also why you can mix the calcium acetate directly with tank water - RODI isn't even needed to dissolve it. The ATO is merely a convenient, automated method which happens to use RODI. You could just drip or dump this stuff in daily - it's safe to do so, just not automated.

Reefing Madness · Jan 31, 2014

J062682l said:
Will vodka or vinegar help drop phosphates.

Don't bank on it taking down the phosphates much, it eats out Nitrates first and foremost, you will see a very minor move in the phosphate numbers only, its not to be used as a phosphate remover.

kv2wr1 · Feb 3, 2014

Here is a good link on Vinegar dosing:
Reefkeeping Magazine - Vinegar Dosing Methodology for the Marine Aquarium

My Cyano is practically gone now. I think adding Chaeto probably helped too.

revhtree · Feb 3, 2014

Started tonight with 5ml per gallon.

NanaReefer · Feb 3, 2014

Very interesting thread. Great info!

Gauge · Feb 3, 2014

Hey Rev. 5ml per gallon is a bunch. I was dosing 8mls total for my 90 gallon and my sps were pale from lack of nutrients. Be careful with a bacteria bloom.

Genesis Corals · Feb 3, 2014

Gauge said:
Hey Rev. 5ml per gallon is a bunch. I was dosing 8mls total for my 90 gallon and my sps were pale from lack of nutrients. Be careful with a bacteria bloom.

I believe he is referring to his top off water, not total tank volume.

Reefing Madness · Feb 3, 2014

Gauge said:
Hey Rev. 5ml per gallon is a bunch. I was dosing 8mls total for my 90 gallon and my sps were pale from lack of nutrients. Be careful with a bacteria bloom.

But if your trying to get nitrates down, its a start, not a daily routine low dose. ya gotta get the nitrates to fall first.