High Alkalinity

[eran]

I have a new 200gal system set up. It has been set up and running with fish and rock for around 6 months. I have an aquatic life hybrid light rail but have waited to add corals until I had radions to go with it. In the mean time, I have been tweeting a new dosing pump and playing with that so when I start to add corals I know how to adjust the pumps. I also started to add kalk to my ato to keep my alk and calcium levels stable(yes I know I didn’t need it since there are no corals but I wanted to make sure that it was there for coralline algae to begin to grow). That’s were I caused my high alk levels. Tested multiple times with Red Sea kit, my alk was as high as 13 and over a three week period is still at 11.5 dkh. I have done a 50 gal water change but really didn’t need to do it that big but I was curious to see how low it would fall by doing it that large. It came down some but not what I was hoping. Two more weeks have gone by and it’s still at 11.5. Is there some way to drop it to 8ish range rapidly so I can start throwing in corals? Remember, it’s just fish and rock at this point. So a quick drop in alk won’t hurt fish.

tank params:

salinity- 1.025
Alk- 11.5
Calc- 400
NO3-5-10
PO4- .045
Mag- 1160

On a side note, I still have no sign of coralline algae after 6 months. I’m not sure but my guess was that having my alk so high wasn’t going to help being so out of wack of natural sea water levels. My magnesium could be higher as well as my calcium but I known how to fix that.
I have not added any magic potion to seed my tank with coralline. I did just scrape some qted rock I had from another system into the tank to help seed it. So, I guess I’ll continue to be patient. That’s kinda been my theme this go around with a new tank.
Thanks

 

[W1ngz]

I think coraline algae needs higher levels of magnesium. A bit of googling seems to say that coraline is made of magnesium calcite, similar to coral skeleton, but with a lot more magnesium in it.

Bump up your mag to ~1300-1400 and the coraline might grow a little quicker, and pull down your alk with it.

 

[eran]

I have a new 200gal system set up. It has been set up and running with fish and rock for around 6 months. I have an aquatic life hybrid light rail but have waited to add corals until I had radions to go with it. In the mean time, I have been tweeting a new dosing pump and playing with that so when I start to add corals I know how to adjust the pumps. I also started to add kalk to my ato to keep my alk and calcium levels stable(yes I know I didn’t need it since there are no corals but I wanted to make sure that it was there for coralline algae to begin to grow). That’s were I caused my high alk levels. Tested multiple times with Red Sea kit, my alk was as high as 13 and over a three week period is still at 11.5 dkh. I have done a 50 gal water change but really didn’t need to do it that big but I was curious to see how low it would fall by doing it that large. It came down some but not what I was hoping. Two more weeks have gone by and it’s still at 11.5. Is there some way to drop it to 8ish range rapidly so I can start throwing in corals? Remember, it’s just fish and rock at this point. So a quick drop in alk won’t hurt fish.

tank params:

salinity- 1.025
Alk- 11.5
Calc- 400
NO3-5-10
PO4- .045
Mag- 1160

On a side note, I still have no sign of coralline algae after 6 months. I’m not sure but my guess was that having my alk so high wasn’t going to help being so out of wack of natural sea water levels. My magnesium could be higher as well as my calcium but I known how to fix that.
I have not added any magic potion to seed my tank with coralline. I did just scrape some qted rock I had from another system into the tank to help seed it. So, I guess I’ll continue to be patient. That’s kinda been my theme this go around with a new tank.
Thanks

I will say that once I get it down I won’t screw with adding kalk until I get some corals in the system and see the need to supplement based on tests. My initial issue was I added kalk at the higher rate per gal then I should have.

at least I know how I screwed it up and won’t do it again. I wanted to see how it would affect my alk so I decided to use the 1 1/2 tsp per gallon of rodi, which is for a higher demand.

like I said, I don’t have a single piece of coral in the tank. It was really just me “investigating” how it would affect my system. And I found out!

 

[EW_Fish]

Whats the ALK in a fresh batch of SW?

 

[eran]

I use instant ocean and have since 2007. It mixes around 11dkh.

 

[EW_Fish]

I use instant ocean and have since 2007. It mixes around 11dkh.

If your Salt is mixing at 11 DKH then why are you trying to run at 8DKH? & and you positive it mixes at 11 DKH? because I just mixed IO from a 200g box 1 bag of 50g DKH was 8.6 and the Reef crystals the same way was 9.6 DKH. Have you tested it yourself?