Kalkwasser ATO or Dosing

[MT_is_a_Pisces]

I was running kalk in my ATO (Tunze) for a few days now all coraline gone from rocks, and rock looking white. Is ATO the best way to run Kalk? Bad on the pump and hard to control the amount.

 

[eea60123]

Have you tested your calcium and alkalinity to determine the depletion rate per day? I would check that and try to adjust your dosing from there. You may need to increase your concentration, you may have too high a demand, or you may not have enough evaporation to dose what you need. The max amount is 1.5 teaspoons per gallon. You also need to keep your ato reservoir sealed as it will lose its potency due to CO2.

 

[C. Eymann]

Do you have the metering pump laying in the bottom of your reservoir that you added kalk to? should be kept suspended off the bottom because I think its sucking up the precipitation on the bottom.

build a stand for the metering pump out of egg crate and PVC fittings.



whats the tanks pH right now? also you may have crashed your alk levels depending how much OD happened?

 

[eea60123]

Check this out and see if it helps. There are 2 parts and I think this is the first. Julian Sprung

 

[C. Eymann]

OP you said rocks look white? does it look like is there a white film on your glass? pumps?
Look where the ato is adding to your tank, look really chalky?

 

[MT_is_a_Pisces]

Have you tested your calcium and alkalinity to determine the depletion rate per day? I would check that and try to adjust your dosing from there. You may need to increase your concentration, you may have too high a demand, or you may not have enough evaporation to dose what you need. The max amount is 1.5 teaspoons per gallon. You also need to keep your ato reservoir sealed as it will lose its potency due to CO2.

I haven't determined the daily depletion rate. But, should the ATO run (stream) for more than 10 seconds?

 

[MT_is_a_Pisces]

Do you have the metering pump laying in the bottom of your reservoir that you added kalk to? should be kept suspended off the bottom because I think its sucking up the precipitation on the bottom.

build a stand for the metering pump out of egg crate and PVC fittings.



whats the tanks pH right now? also you may have crashed your alk levels depending how much OD happened?

PH was 8.2 and dKH 10.0
Built the stand. Will test daily Alk, pH and CA daily.

 

[MT_is_a_Pisces]

OP you said rocks look white? does it look like is there a white film on your glass? pumps?
Look where the ato is adding to your tank, look really chalky?

Yes chalky. See pics

 

[C. Eymann]

PH was 8.2 and dKH 10.0
Built the stand. Will test daily Alk, pH and CA daily.

Yeah, sounds like you were sucking up settled kalk, but from the params it sounds like you avoided the Alk crash so it didnt OD the tank too bad, wont be an issue now that you built a stand for the metering pump.

The coralline will come back, might be a wise Idea to dissasemble and clean your pumps as the precip likes form on warmer surfaces so it likes to build up on the magnet/ prop and can cause it to slow down/jam.

just my .02

Smooth sailing from here I hope.

 

[Scurvy]

I always liked running a fully saturated kalk mix via a dosing pump then letting the ato make up the regular evaporation difference with fresh water. More control on dosage with less wear on your ato pump. I would dose 150 - 200ml overnight from about 7pm to 9am with dosing pump.

 

[MT_is_a_Pisces]

Check this out and see if it helps. There are 2 parts and I think this is the first. Julian Sprung

Julian Sprung just poured the Kalk mix right into the tank. I'll try the ATO pumo on egg crate method until I can get an economical doser.

Thanks everyone for the great information.

 

[C. Eymann]

Be careful with kalk, I have nuked my tank with kalk before using aqualifters + security timers- many years ago, it worked great for a while didn't realize security timers default to "on" when the memory battery goes dead, wiped out 80% of my coral.