question about kalkwasser

[melonheadorion]

i am running into an issue where i feel that my PH is lowering too much at night, and could benefit from being a bit more stable, so to speak. i just did a water change today and as of 11pm, my PH is showing to be 7.6 according to a red sea test kit. i took a water sample outside to see if it was the air in the room, and after shaking the water outside, and then adding the test material, there wasnt a change in the outcome.
also, i am not using a reactor at this time, nor do i have any kind of reactor.
right now, my calcium is at 400 and my alk is 9.5, so i have some room to play with, but i feel that those numbers are a good happy medium. ive read that using kalkwasser would be a good thing to dose to raise the PH. my question comes down to how much, in any, will it change where i am at with calcium and alk at this time? obviously, if it does affect it, it will be based on how much i dose,. but would kw affect those two readings as it is? i do dose calcium and alk with the seachem 2 part bottles, but i havent really had to much lately as my levels have stayed pretty steady at these levels already.
anyone that has used it, how long does it last? from what i have read, it seems that it is something that would be dosed every night, but i am curious is it something that should be dosed through the night, or something that can be manually added? i do not have an automatic dosing setup, so thats why i ask

 

[Jekyl]

Have a skimmer? Running the air input outside with some tubing or increasing surface agitation will raise Ph.

 

[Spieg]

Have a skimmer? Running the air input outside with some tubing will increase Ph.

This is what I did and my pH stays between 8.2 to 8.4 all the time now. If you have high CO2 in your house, agitating the water surface will likely make things worse.

Kalk will increase both dKH and Ca.

You could make a CO2 scrubber but the media gets expensive pretty fast, so I don't recommend that if you can avoid it.

Or you could always stop breathing in your house LOL.

 

[Pico bam]

Have a skimmer? Running the air input outside with some tubing or increasing surface agitation will raise Ph.

These are some good tips along with opening a window/putting a fan over the tank.

To answer your question if you want to run kalk id recommend getting a dosing pump. They have some nice cheap kamoer doseing pumps on brs 60$. If I where you id quite the seachem dosing and switch to kalk with a magnesium supplement. Do not underestimate the power of kalkwasser as your levels can raise quickly. The ph boost is a great benefit. I think generally if people tell you to avoid kalkwasser they haven't used it. Its very cheap and effective. What size is your tank and what do you have in it? You might want to start at like 1/4 teaspoon per gallon. You can get a 4 pound bag for 30$ you'll save greatly on two part in the long run. Id recommend dosing evenly throughout the day as just dosing during night is a bit of a run around. Good luck!

 

[melonheadorion]

i think i mistyped something in my post. i meant to say that i am not running a skimmer at the moment. i will be in the future once i get my tank stand made, but for right now, i have to do some minor things to keep everything where it is.

right now, im just on a 20 gal tank, but will be going to a 65 in the near future. at the moment, my magnesium is at 1350, would it be harmful by dosing it, that it would rasie MG too much?

 

[rhostam]

Agree. At your stage, KW is an easy win and uncomplicated. I use super concentrated via a reactor and use dosing pumps to dose based on pH and Alk readings.

 

[melonheadorion]

with my setup, a doser just doesnt make a ton of sense. i work at home, and the tank is right next to me, so dosing isnt much of an issue. my plan would be to do an elaborate setup to make things easiest, but i use opportunites like this to get hands on experience with thing, doing it the hard way and learning about things, before i go to automated things, so doing things manually doesnt bother me.

now, when i get my larger tank setup, my plan is to do things like ATO, reactors, dosing pumps, etc, but doing things all at once requires money, which i dont want to drop all at once.

 

[Randy Holmes-Farley Verified Community Expert]

Shaking water outside is not a good way to aerate. Driving out CO2 takes substantial effort.

pH will rise outside, or the pH measurement is in error.

 

[Jekyl]

i think i mistyped something in my post. i meant to say that i am not running a skimmer at the moment. i will be in the future once i get my tank stand made, but for right now, i have to do some minor things to keep everything where it is.

right now, im just on a 20 gal tank, but will be going to a 65 in the near future. at the moment, my magnesium is at 1350, would it be harmful by dosing it, that it would rasie MG too much?

Kalkwasser doesn't add magnesium. It raises calcium and alkalinity. Try just adding more surface agitation with your powerheads.

 

[melonheadorion]

Kalkwasser doesn't add magnesium. It raises calcium and alkalinity. Try just adding more surface agitation with your powerheads.

i have as much surface agitation as i can without spraying it all over the walls one of the powerheads, i actually have pointing to the surface, and actually rooster tails the water out of the surface.

 

[melonheadorion]

These are some good tips along with opening a window/putting a fan over the tank.

To answer your question if you want to run kalk id recommend getting a dosing pump. They have some nice cheap kamoer doseing pumps on brs 60$. If I where you id quite the seachem dosing and switch to kalk with a magnesium supplement. Do not underestimate the power of kalkwasser as your levels can raise quickly. The ph boost is a great benefit. I think generally if people tell you to avoid kalkwasser they haven't used it. Its very cheap and effective. What size is your tank and what do you have in it? You might want to start at like 1/4 teaspoon per gallon. You can get a 4 pound bag for 30$ you'll save greatly on two part in the long run. Id recommend dosing evenly throughout the day as just dosing during night is a bit of a run around. Good luck!

with regards to this, if KW doesnt affect mg, would i need to ddose it if my mg is in a good spot (1350)? just curious as to the relation of MG with use of KW

 

[Randy Holmes-Farley Verified Community Expert]

with regards to this, if KW doesnt affect mg, would i need to ddose it if my mg is in a good spot (1350)? just curious as to the relation of MG with use of KW

No need to dose magnesium unless and until it drops below where you want it.

IMO, 1300-1350 ppm is fine.