Need a 6-month check-up - params

Mark Derail · Feb 3, 2018

First - all is well. Other than hermit crabs waging war against each other and always catching and eating my snails. I've tried putting more food during feedings.

I feed a mix of pellets, flakes, mysis once daily, and PolypLab ReefRoids twice a week.

System is a 50g DT and a 40g sump. Many live rocks in both. Chaeto in the sump with magic mud, a Reef Octupus 202-S skimmer (rated for 200g) running 24/7. Lights over Chaeto running 12h on-off.

Sump temp 26.3c, DT temp 25.5c
pH 8.1
Ammonia 0.1
Nitrite 0.1
Nitrate (below scale) 4
Phosphate 0.03
Salinity 1.028 (no ATO yet)
Alk 7.0
Calcium 500 (the entire 1.0ml from test kit made new color)
Magnesium 1500 (the entire 1.0ml from test kit made new color)

I dosed manually after a 10% WC of Instant Ocean, Seachem Reef Complete for 340 liters.
The last month I have done 10% WC without adding anything.

I have been postponing doing the Balling method with Aquaforest 123+ until things were stable. I think they are now. I want to wait a week and retest Calc + Mag to see if they go down w/o adding anything.

My first question - what should I add to up the Alk (dKH) to be higher? I have Kalkwasser and I can bake some baking soda, but want advice first. Maybe buying a bottle of something?

olecaptainj · Feb 3, 2018

Well your alk is pretty low if you plan to keep sps I’d shoot more for 8-9.

Also you have ammonia and nitrites in a 6 month old tank? Those should be absolute zero, so you really should find out why they are high.

Calcium is on the higher side, it should be around 420-450.

Salinity is high, should be 1.025 - 1.026.

Mark Derail · Feb 3, 2018

I have one sps and mostly lps w/mixed reef. Everything grows, albeit very slowly. Tank water is "dirty" on purpose.

Params were much better when I was doing 50% WCs every second week & heavy skimming. I think tank still isn't cycled fully, and I was keeping things too clean.

Without ATO and the high evaporation (winter heating, it is -20c outside), I've been adding manually some RODI water daily. So the SG varies between 1.026 & 1.028 daily.

I've got some baking soda cooking, I'll mix some with RODI. Following Randy's recipe.
http://www.advancedaquarist.com/2004/4/chemistry#section-11

Going to try bringing up the dKH slowly over a week to see.

Randy Holmes-Farley · Feb 4, 2018

Are the calcium and magnesium the actual values (meaning the color endpoint was just reached at the end of the syringe) or are they higher than that due to you not getting tot he endpoint?

In either case, lowering the salinity will drop them and they are likely fine.

I'd stop measuring nitrite. It isn't useful and may just be test error.

The alk is OK, but boosting it to 8 dKH is a fine plan.

saltyfilmfolks · Feb 4, 2018

All looks fine. IMO.

In all honesty, I used NSW for years , alk about 7.5, and did a 5gal wc every other with no dosing in my sumped 55 and non sumped 30. I never had issues. Sps or otherwise. And I’m taking about Acros too.

I’d honestly just consider doing a 5 gal every other.

An ato would be super helpful for you. If you’d like some easy diy or leads on inexpensive ones I can help you out with that. Then you can also add kalwasser if you like.

I like simple. Balling btw, is just two part. With a lot more words.
I just went back to two part.

Mark Derail · Feb 4, 2018

I haven't started 2-part or balling - I'm worried about the costs down the road with the Aquaforest 123+ balling system.
I bought the 3 jugs as a kit a bit too early, now I have them sitting around.

I was really impressed with Randy's recipes, how something as simple as cooking baking soda for Alk. I baked a box, and used 5 tea spoons in about half a gallon of heated RODI. Added slowly, a bit every 5-10 mins.

Next day, the dKH at 9.3, and using the same testing kit with the Instant Ocean replacement SW, the clean SW is 9.0.

My next step is putting my skimmer on the same timer as the lights over the chaeto. If all is stable after that a week later, gonna start up that doser machine. That too has been sitting around for 5+ months.

Thanks all for the help.