Keeping a stable reef with kalkwasser ???

[Eric23]

So I've been struggling for over a year with my 28 gallon nano trying to keep stable levels. I'm using dd h2ocean pro salts doing a 5 gallon change every Friday and dosing 5ml a day of esv mag, 10 ml a day of esp part 1, and 10 ml a day of esv part 2 which keeps my parameters around 1300 mag, 8.5 dkh, and 420 ca

The problem is that I want to stop dosing but I'm scared to start using kalkwasser with vinegar because there are equal amount of posts both for and against it. Im looking for a clear pros vs cons post but can seem to find one
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[impur]

RDWHAB - Relax don't worry have a homebrew Sorry, my other hobby

I say go for it. I used kalk for 4 or 5 years on a couple different reefs. Now I have a triple doser so I stopped using it, but it did a great job of not only keeping alk/calcium levels up, but keeping my pH where it should be. Just start slow, do 1 teaspoon kalk per gal of RO and measure each day. If it doesn't keep up, add the 2nd teaspoon. I don't think you are going to need the little extra that adding vinegar would eek out. Make sure you have failsafes in place to ensure that a bunch of the topoff water with kalk won't dump into the tank. You will be fine, keep us updated on how it goes!

 

[Eric23]

I have no way to limit the amount of top off I use. Currently I have a 5 gallon bucket of ro hooked up to a Tom's aqua lifter and that usually lasts me around 2 week's so that's 2.5 gallons a week which works out to around .35 gallons a day. I have no idea if that is ok or not for a 28 gallon tank using kalk.

I was thinking of using the vinegar to keep the ph down if I end up using to much top off water and also I've read that it helps keeping p04 down not that I'm having any problems but still a good side affect

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[Pkunk35]

I dose my kalk with a glass milk bottle and drip it in overnight. I also did this for my old 29 gal and it worked great.

Thinking you'll still be dosing 2 part tho. What do you keep in the tank?

 

[shred5]

In my opinion kalk is awsum. Helps maintain alk and calcium and can also help maintain ph, It also helps with phospate... Only downside is it can push ph high on systems that already run at a high ph especially on small systems.

You will still need to add magnesium.

 

[Eric23]

I keep a mixed reef with a good amount of sps my worry is the ph going high so thats why I was thinking about using the vinegar but I only use a bio cube skimmer and I dont know if my tank could handle the extra carbon from the vinegar

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[lakeviewink]

I use kalk saturated top off water w/ a DIY ATO set-up. It's awesome as long as your Mg is high enough. I like to keep it 1400-1450.

I was always a little scared because I use a float with an MJ 400 and I had heard all the warnings. That being said, I had a float switch failure, three times in a week, and dumped about a gallon or more kalkwasser in my system. Now, here is the weird part, I thought everything was gonna die and instead I just added some soda water( my Ph was at 8.9) and slowly brought the level down and everything was fine. In fact, I would say everything flourished. I have a mixed system, SPS, lps, zoas, and 2 nems. So don't worry too much. Just start slow, like was stated before. JMHO

 

[Furiousreefer]

I've been running kalk thru ATO the entire time (3+y) and my tank is doing well. I had DYI ATO with two float swiches and attached the ATO to the timmer on the controller. Since PH is high during the day with the lights are on. That's why I only allow my ATO runs late at night. My evaporation is around 1-2g a day depends on time of year. It evap a little more during winter when the home heater is running. I am using the Aqua lifter for my ATO. Aqua lifter will gives me 3g/hour. Therefore, I am setting my timmer for the ATO is an hour at night. The worse case scenerio if both float swiches failed, the timmer will shut it self after an hour (3g max) If the timmer also failed. The controller will kill the outlet if Ph reached an alarming level.

I had only one accident during these three years period and is has nothing do with equipments. I was messing around with the sump and knocked the ATO output line into the sump. When my ATO finished topoff my sump, the pump shutted down and the water siphoned back into my reserve tank overflow my reserve tank causing the return pump burned out.

 

[impur]

I've been running kalk thru ATO the entire time (3+y) and my tank is doing well. I had DYI ATO with two float swiches and attached the ATO to the timmer on the controller. Since PH is high during the day with the lights are on. That's why I only allow my ATO runs late at night. My evaporation is around 1-2g a day depends on time of year. It evap a little more during winter when the home heater is running. I am using the Aqua lifter for my ATO. Aqua lifter will gives me 3g/hour. Therefore, I am setting my timmer for the ATO is an hour at night. The worse case scenerio if both float swiches failed, the timmer will shut it self after an hour (3g max) If the timmer also failed. The controller will kill the outlet if Ph reached an alarming level.

I had only one accident during these three years period and is has nothing do with equipments. I was messing around with the sump and knocked the ATO output line into the sump. When my ATO finished topoff my sump, the pump shutted down and the water siphoned back into my reserve tank overflow my reserve tank causing the return pump burned out.

That is how I have my DIY ATO setup as well, but I let it go 24/7. I've had 1 floatswitch fail in 5 years and it failed in the off position, but knowing that I had the backup floatswitch really helps you worry less.