Dosing??

[Randy Holmes-Farley Verified Community Expert]

What is you suggestion for that? Today is my daily water change day. After I finish I'll do another round of tests to compare.

What salt mix? if it is normal IO, that may be why it is low.

 

[jorahx]

What salt mix? if it is normal IO, that may be why it is low.

Nsw, I don't have the space to have mixing containers in my tiny apt.

 

[Randy Holmes-Farley Verified Community Expert]

Nsw, I don't have the space to have mixing containers in my tiny apt.

From a store? Some stores might mix stuff into it, especially buffers. I don't think you can take NSW and get to these parameters in any normal way:

salt 1.026
alk 7.8
cal 370

That said, I'd get some calcium chloride (nearly any hobby brand is OK) and boost it by 50 ppm over a few days.

 

[jorahx]

From a store? Some stores might mix stuff into it, especially buffers. I don't think you can take NSW and get to these parameters in any normal way:

salt 1.026
alk 7.8
cal 370

That said, I'd get some calcium chloride (nearly any hobby brand is OK) and boost it by 50 ppm over a few days.

Yeah from a lfs. I have no idea how I have those parameters. I get it from the same store every week.

 

[jorahx]

Okay I'll check and see if they have calcium chloride while I'm there. Thank you for the help.

 

[Randy Holmes-Farley Verified Community Expert]

You can use this calculator for many products to see how much is needed to make that correction:

http://reef.diesyst.com/chemcalc/chem_calc3.html

 

[kinetic]

How big of containers do you need to mix? The containers you use to take the NSW home from the store is plenty big to mix yourself. Also your tank would probably do fine with a weekly 5% to 10% water change (unless you're running super high bioload). Change enough water to reduce po4/no3 to what you need. The rest of the things you need to replenish should be through Alk/Ca dosing. There's all sorts of trace minerals and stuff, but even with 5% changes you should be fine. Only increase your weekly amount of water change if you really need that much more export.

 

[Randy Holmes-Farley Verified Community Expert]

What is you suggestion for that? Today is my daily water change day. After I finish I'll do another round of tests to compare.

Boost calcium to 420 ppm with a calcium chloride supplement (BRS, Kent, etc.).

 

[jorahx]

Boost calcium to 420 ppm with a calcium chloride supplement (BRS, Kent, etc.).

Yep I bought it. Will do it when I get back home Sunday. I'll keep you updated with daily tests when doing additives.

 

[jorahx]

after a few days of boosting calcium today my numbers are
alk 7.8
mag 1320
cal 430

i will test every day at the same time to see if they adjust.

 

[Randy Holmes-Farley Verified Community Expert]

Looks good!

Happy Reefing!

 

[jorahx]

Thanks for you help. And everybody else [emoji16]

 

[jorahx]

So what are the ideal parameters to aim for? For alk I found a big window. Didn't know if I should dose to the middle or what everybody try's to keep them at.

 

[kinetic]

So what are the ideal parameters to aim for? For alk I found a big window. Didn't know if I should dose to the middle or what everybody try's to keep them at.

For Alk: 8
For Ca: 470

Kind of arbitrary. The first few days I was keeping it at those numbers, then put in a dosing pump and they stayed those numbers ever since! They fall into the window of what's suggested. So I've just stuck with it.

 

[Randy Holmes-Farley Verified Community Expert]

So what are the ideal parameters to aim for? For alk I found a big window. Didn't know if I should dose to the middle or what everybody try's to keep them at.

Depends on what is in the tank and what the nutrient levels are, but 7-11 dKH is fine for most tanks unless nutrients are very low.

 

[jorahx]

Tanks mostly torches, hammers, mushrooms, one blasto, one very unhappy Duncan, some gsp, one zoa, some birds nest that I might have placed to high and close to my lights as the tips started to go white.

Around 20 nitrates.

I just don't know if being near the bottom of the alk scale is fine. Or if I should maintain it to a higher level, or how to decide what that level would be.

 

[Randy Holmes-Farley Verified Community Expert]

Tanks mostly torches, hammers, mushrooms, one blasto, one very unhappy Duncan, some gsp, one zoa, some birds nest that I might have placed to high and close to my lights as the tips started to go white.

Around 20 nitrates.

I just don't know if being near the bottom of the alk scale is fine. Or if I should maintain it to a higher level, or how to decide what that level would be.

At the low end, a real 6.5 dKH is typically fine (many parts of the ocean are 6.5 dKH or so). 7 dKH gives you more allowance for measurement error.

Higher alk often leads to faster hard coral growth. With some SPS and too low of N and/or P, that faster growth can be a problem as it can lead to burnt tips, possibly because the skeleton grows faster than tissue can keep up.