reef crystals absolute junk?

Wick · Jun 21, 2020

testing my Alkalinity on a fresh batch of mixed water with reef crystals and it is coming up as 0. I tested Alkalinity straight and it showed that there was alkalinity present. I'm using a red sea test kit. Anyone else have this problem?

homer1475 · Jun 21, 2020

Expired test kit? User error?

RC usually has very high ALK.

Wick · Jun 21, 2020

homer1475 said:
Expired test kit? User error?

RC usually has very high ALK.

07/21 it expires. used 5ml of tank water then drop, shake, check for blue or yellow. and repeat till yellow.

homer1475 · Jun 21, 2020

200g box, 160g pail, or 50g bags?

If it was a pail, you might want to try and roll it around to mix it up. Stratification is a real thing, BRS did a video on it.

Other then that, maybe just a bad batch? It's one the reason I switched back to regular IO years ago.

Wick · Jun 21, 2020

200 gallon box. This is with straight alk. I'm really thinking this killed 80 percent of my corals. I was using fritz red box a while ago. Like 5 months ago everything was good. Frustrating.

Wick · Jun 21, 2020

Calcium is pathetic too. Hanna checker

MTBake · Jun 21, 2020

Are you sure salinity is good?

Those are some bizarre numbers you're getting their. Maybe it is a bad batch of salt. I would try contacting the manufacturer to see if there has been any issues/recalls recently.

atomic081 · Jun 21, 2020

Ive always used reef crystals without any issue.

homer1475 · Jun 21, 2020

MTBake said:
Are you sure salinity is good?

Those are some bizarre numbers you're getting their.

+1
Definitely numbers are way off. Check salinity.

Stoney · Jun 21, 2020

homer1475 said:
Other then that, maybe just a bad batch? It's one the reason I switched back to regular IO years ago.

Is regular IO less prone to bad batches? Been thinking about switching from RC, mainly because I dont want organics sitting in my mixing tank. But I haven't had a bad batch of RC yet. I always measure alk when I open a new 50g bag and it's always between 9-11 when mixed to 1.026.

Wick · Jun 21, 2020

mixed at 1.025 for 20 gallons. with heater from night before and pump moving water. i bought fritz blue box from LFS which i used to use. Going to test out this once its mixed and get my coral into hospital tank. (20 gallons)