Help with dosing and maintaining chemistry

[cleaner_shrimp]

I have a fluval 13.5 tank with about 15 corals but 13 are frag sized. I have been dosing fritz part 1 and 2 to my tank and have maintained 8.5 alkalinity and somewhere between 420-470 calcium.(I’m still figuring out how to do the salifert calcium correctly). I have low ph of 7.9 and have never had it come above 8.0 and I know that it’s not something to chase but if I could slightly raise It, maybe I could have better growth and coloration.

I have aqua vitro eight.four and I know it increases ph and alkalinity but theoretically if I lower the dose of the fritz alk and measure out the equivalent alkalinity increase of the eight.four. Could I dose it with my alk in the morning and have it slightly have a increase in my ph while adding the same . I dose daily about .40ish alkalinity. Btw i dose 2ml of fritz alk and it says 5ml per 10 gallons increases alk by 1.06 dkh. So if I lower my fritz dose to about 1.5ml and use eight.four for the rest of the dose which is like .10dkh of alk, can that boost my ph slightly for the day and still make up for the alkalinity?

 

[Spare time]

Eight four is simply an alk liquid that combines carbonates and bicarbonates, meaning that it will raise pH + alk rather than a pure bicarbonate additive which has little impact on pH. Fritz alk is pretty much the same product, but might contain more bicarbonate than carbonate.

Bicarbonate and carbonate both raise alk, but carbonate is what raises pH (bicarb has a hydrogen attached where as carbonate does not).

Regardless of which you dose, you just want to make sure to add it very slowly preferably into some area of high flow.

 

[Randy Holmes-Farley Verified Community Expert]

Yes, if pH raising is the goal, eight four is not the best product. Pure carbonate or hydroxide are better pH raising per unit of alk added.