How is this even possible? Salinity at 1.034

[Dom]

IWierd was going to post the same thing….I did this before: mixed up my make up water with the RO jug … tank was at 40ppt for a long while with no noticeable downside …
So unfortunately can’t offer what the limits of salt tolerances are before negative impact

Yes; early in my "career" I made the same mistake; topping off with fresh salt water.

 

[Reef Wizard]

How are you calibrating your refrac? And the refrac and hydrometer both say 34?

Not sure about sharkbait but I I have two refracs. An old one and a new one I just bought. I calibrated both to a 35ppt solution from BRS. I have other tanks and they all have tested the same no jumps so it wasnt a test error.

I have a bucket that is different color that I fill up with RO water and salt water never goes in it.

It has to be evaporation some how but I have my auto top off on with a sensor and I never let my pump run dry for it.

I am using reef crystals so perhaps precipitate build up had some salt in it over time and thats it? @Sharkbait19 Are you using Instant ocean?

What sort of wizardry is this? If you can manufacture salt from thin air, you are going to be a very rich alchemist, lol. If your test method has been consistent and accurate perhaps you've lost 15% of water volume through evaporation, or added 15% of volume of rocks, or added 15% of saltwater somehow.

 

[Doctorgori]

Yes; early in my "career" I made the same mistake; topping off with fresh salt water.

I have a bucket that is different color that I fill up with RO water and salt water never goes in it.

Yeah, I do this now and suggest this to anyone moving fwd:

 

[Randy Holmes-Farley Verified Community Expert]

Not sure about sharkbait but I I have two refracs. An old one and a new one I just bought. I calibrated both to a 35ppt solution from BRS. I have other tanks and they all have tested the same no jumps so it wasnt a test error.

I have a bucket that is different color that I fill up with RO water and salt water never goes in it.

It has to be evaporation some how but I have my auto top off on with a sensor and I never let my pump run dry for it.

I am using reef crystals so perhaps precipitate build up had some salt in it over time and thats it? @Sharkbait19 Are you using Instant ocean?

Precipitates where?

There’s no process in the tank that raises salinity.

 

[Reef Wizard]

Precipitates where?

There’s no process in the tank that raises salinity.

Its in the sump the brown coating however its probably evaporation some how.

 

[Dom]

Precipitates where?

There’s no process in the tank that raises salinity.

Wouldn't the process of evaporation raise salinity?

 

[Northern Flicker]

My feeling is that your previous water changes were being done with incorrect salinity.

The fastest way I can think of that doesn’t involve a bad refract reading or evap would be that you have been doing water changes at a much higher salinity and slowly raising the entire tank.

It wouldn’t be noticeable if your measuring tool was still giving you comfortable readings.

In my experience, this is actually the best way to raise or lower salinity over time in a controlled manner - in your case you could just take small amounts of water out daily and replace with small amounts of straight RO.

 

[Randy Holmes-Farley Verified Community Expert]

Wouldn't the process of evaporation raise salinity?

Yes, that was noted above by many people. The rise from 1.026 to 1.034 requires about 24% of the water to have evaporated without replacement. .That’s a big drop to not notice.

Evaporation is not what I’d call an in Tank process, if that is what you meant. It’s a process of something leaving the tank.