new to dosing

[ssww21]

I just purchased a new dosing machine for my tank. I want to raise the alk, calcium and magnesium levels for my corals. How many mls should I start with on a daily basis to slowly raise these levels. All three of these are now below recommended levels. Magnesium was at 1260, calcium at 350 and alkalinity was at 6.7 dkh. Should I dose once a day or several times over a 24 hour period. Your help with this matter is greatly appreciated.

 

[PatW]

It is impossible to say how,many mls you need.

First, I do not know the volume of your aquarium.
Second, I do not know how fast your fauna consumes Mg, Ca, and ALK.
Third, I do not know what your target levels are.
Fourth, I do not know the concentration of your additive solutions.
And fifth, I do not know how many days you want to take to reach your target.

But knowing the above, there are calculators to help you. Randy has one in the chemistry section and bulk Reef Supply has one on their web site.

 

[rcpalmer1]

Like stated above there are many factors. I personally like BRS 2part. Pick what Alk level you want. Use their calculator to tell you how much to add. Once you get your tank where you want it. Test every day and see how much it drops. If you only have a few corals it may not drop much. I like the Hanna Alk tester as it gives you a digital read out. If you have a 0.2 drop a day depending on the size of tank use the BRC calculator to determine how much to dose a day. It is also best to test at the same time every day.

I run my lights 12 hours a day. I use to have to dose 6ml a day. I set my pump to dose every 2 hours 1ml while the lights are on. Alk is dosed 10 minutes after the hour and Calcium is 20 minutes after the hour. Mag is 30 minutes after the hour once a day. As my corals grew I increased to 12ml. 1ml per hour for the 12 hours the lights are on mg 1ml/ 6hour. I am currently dosing 54ml a day. My current dosing is alternating 4ml to 5ml every hour for the 12 hours my lights are on and Mg 1ml/4hours. I dose 11am to 11 pm and test my water at 6am.

I am not saying this is the right way to do it but is the way I do it. I have had tons of growth. So much that I am having problems with trace elements. I had my tank a 8dkh for a year. After seeing some research I raised to 11dkh. Corals that had no noticeable growth in a year doubled in size in 6 months.

I hope this at lest gives you something to help make your decision.

 

[ssww21]

I will check bulk reef supply and see what it says. My tank is 150 gallons with a 40 gallon sump. I guess I will start out with small amounts and the check daily to see what my levels are at. I'm not sure what the exact desired level should be, but according to my research they should be higher

 

[i_declare_bankruptcy]

I'm starting automated dosing as well. Here's my approach:

If you want to start automated dosing you need to figure out your consumption rate first. Bring your levels up to where you want them by manually dosing (careful not to do it too fast -- google acceptable rates), then measure each of those elements at the same time each day for some amount of time (a week?). Be sure to test at the same time every day and dose manually as needed to maintain the levels you desire. Essentially you want to plot a chart of consumption and calculate the average for each of the three. I suggest computing an average because hobby test kits aren't amazingly accurate and there will be fluctuations and human error.

Then you will know what your daily consumption is and you can then instruct your dosing pump to dose accordingly.

I'd suggest calibrating your dosing pump first. It may not dose at the advertised rate. You can do this by filling a jar with RO water, then run the doser for 10 minutes, dosing into a graduated cylinder (or whatever applicable, accurate, measuring device), seeing how many mL it dosed and divide by 10. You now have the dose rate in terms of mL/min. You can then apply that dose rate to correct the daily drop you averaged previously.

Example:

Tank measures ca at 400.

Correct ca to desired level (let's say 450). Use the BRS calculator (if you use BRS calcium solution) to calculate how many mL of ca to dose. Let's just say *for the sake of example* 100mL will add 50ppm ca to your tank. Test after correcting to make sure you hit your target.

450 - 400 = 50 -> that is the rate that the tank consumed ca in a day.

Repeat this daily for a week, recording the difference of the measured calcium and the desired level of calcium each day.

Let's say you come up with this:
Day 1: 50
Day 2: 40
Day 3: 55
Day 4: 60
Day 5: 50

That yields an average of 51ppm drop per day of ca.

Let's say you calibrated your dosing pump and it runs at a rate of 2 mL / min.

You need to correct 51 ppm / day for calcium, so the doser must run for ~100 mL / 2 mL/min = 50 min per day.

Now you can automate that with a timer or Apex or whatever. Not sure if you should split that up -- maybe someone else can fill in for that.

 

[i_declare_bankruptcy]

Also, from my research, if you want to run a higher dkh, you need to ensure you have sufficient nutrients in the water or you might burn your SPS.

 

[biophilia]

Nice write-up @i_declare_bankruptcy . One thing I'd add that has been really helpful for me:

If you have a nano tank, even the minimum dose might be too much and can cause spikes in alkalinity throughout the day. For my nano I dilute my 2-part reservoirs 1 part solution to 3 parts RODI. This way I can split my doses up into something like 1/4-1/2 mL at a time every hour and my alkalinity never varies by more than 0.15 DKH throughout the day even those my tank has a 2.5+ DKH/day alkalinity draw.

 

[ssww21]

great write up