Tropic Marin Pro Reef Salt Alkalinity 5.2 dKH

[homer1475]

Kind of like the trident reagents, they give you a little extra(in the case of the hanna it's 5ml extra), and using that last little bit, gives screwy numbers.

At 18 tests it should be fine. Can you run to an LFS and just get a salifert or redsea kit just to double check? I would most certainly be double checking before I made any changes.

 

[Gaspipe]

Thanks for your posts about this. Let me try to help.

First, let me explain that our office has been closed for the holidays and so I have not been getting my forum alerts as I usually do. That is why I have not responded to the questions put to me yet on this thread.

I also want to say, that you for sending the PM to me. That is always a better way to get to me rather than in an open thread that I might miss. For now, I will respond here for everyone else that is following along on this thread.

I figured you were away for the holidays and I'm not in a rush. Like I said I have been using this salt and wasn't even going to mention it to you until someone brought up the point of quality control.

Now on to your specific alkalinity question... I am a big fan of Hanna Checkers. However, we have had a number of instances where they have pointed to low alkalinity, in freshly mixed salt water, that turned out to be not correct. I don't know why this happens. There could be a number of reasons, and I am not pointing a finger either to the Hanna checker directly or to you as the user. I'm just stating that I have seen this to be the case more than once. In those cases, samples of salt, directly from the customer, proved to be in the normal alkalinity range. More importantly, it turned out that the salinity of some of the systems being maintained, in those instances, were in the high range as a result of the checking over the past period of time.

I tested the new batch 24 hours later and then 24 hours later again. Then dosed a small amount of baking soda (5g for 15-20 gallons)

I also tested my older salt water batch that was done weeks earlier. As well as my DT.

I'll make a point to bring a sample to my LFS for them to test when I make a new batch and after I test.

I am not saying that this is the case on your instance. However, the last 4 times I have had this complaint come into the office, and was able to get samples of salt from the customer to check the alkalinity, this has been the case. So I want to just say... I would approach this situation with a little caution. If you do find that there is an inaccuracy in your results, please DO NOT correct it immediately. Corals NEVER like fast changes even when going from bad to good. I would double or triple test your alkalinity with other methods. Reagent test kits are pretty good in most cases in relation to alkalinity. I wouldn't even think about making any changes of anything until I verified the alkalinity result with at least two different reagent kits. This is one of those situations when reefing friends and your LFS can really be helpful.

I am currently dosing kalkwasser into my DT at a very slow rate. My goal is to increase the dKH by .01 per day. Tank's consumption is .01 per day... So I dose .02dKH worth of kalkwasser per day

I have just dosed baking soda as mentioned to the SW bin only. Not the DT. I figured with a weekly water change of 10% and the lite kalk dosing I will gradually be able to raise alkalinity to the 8+ goal.

In the end, I am available to help no matter what you find out. I would love to get the lot number, of your salt bucket, just because it always is a good idea for us to check our batch controls whenever there is a question. And a call or email will enable me to help you directly figure out what is going on.

I hope this is helpful.

Lou, you live up to your respectful reputation of a businessman and hobbyist, so thank you for all you do!

I'm not sure where to find the lot number, so I snapped a few pics. Let me know if you need more info.

 

[Lou Ekus]

I figured you were away for the holidays and I'm not in a rush. Like I said I have been using this salt and wasn't even going to mention it to you until someone brought up the point of quality control.

I tested the new batch 24 hours later and then 24 hours later again. Then dosed a small amount of baking soda (5g for 15-20 gallons)

I also tested my older salt water batch that was done weeks earlier. As well as my DT.

I'll make a point to bring a sample to my LFS for them to test when I make a new batch and after I test.


I am currently dosing kalkwasser into my DT at a very slow rate. My goal is to increase the dKH by .01 per day. Tank's consumption is .01 per day... So I dose .02dKH worth of kalkwasser per day

I have just dosed baking soda as mentioned to the SW bin only. Not the DT. I figured with a weekly water change of 10% and the lite kalk dosing I will gradually be able to raise alkalinity to the 8+ goal.


Lou, you live up to your respectful reputation of a businessman and hobbyist, so thank you for all you do!

I'm not sure where to find the lot number, so I snapped a few pics. Let me know if you need more info.

Thanks Gas....ill get control values on this batch. But still follow up with you LFS testing and let me know what you find.

 

[Gaspipe]

Not to beat a horse to death...

1. Just tested and alkalinity was 8.0 on the nose.
2. tested the syringe and it was 1.0 on the dot with and w/out tip
3. Tossed the old reagent and will be testing with new reagent, new syringe and new tip

Once this batch is complete I will create a NEW batch, test w/ my kit, bring to LFS and confirm numbers, then report here.

I want to thank each and every one who replied and offered advice, suggestions, and overall concern!

Tip of the day: use only 25ml or the 30ml in the reagent.

 

[Randy Holmes-Farley Verified Community Expert]

The assumption being made is that the salt itself is low. Which I said in a previous post that we may have all jumped to that conclusion, but after I thought about it for a little bit, I don't think we have enough data to actually draw that conclusion, so I asked the OP what his pH was, and you assumed I thought that a low pH indicates a low Alk, which I do not. The two are related, but one does not cause the other. However, if BOTH are low, it could indicate something else, such as Chlorine in the water, or something else gone wrong.

I do not know what you are referring to as chlorine won't cause low pH or low alk, but I'm going to move on from this unless there's more to discuss.

 

[Lou Ekus]

Not to beat a horse to death...

1. Just tested and alkalinity was 8.0 on the nose.
2. tested the syringe and it was 1.0 on the dot with and w/out tip
3. Tossed the old reagent and will be testing with new reagent, new syringe and new tip

Once this batch is complete I will create a NEW batch, test w/ my kit, bring to LFS and confirm numbers, then report here.

I want to thank each and every one who replied and offered advice, suggestions, and overall concern!

Tip of the day: use only 25ml or the 30ml in the reagent.

I'm not sure i understand. Did you test with new reagents and now everything is fine? Or am I misundetstanding?

 

[Gaspipe]

I'm not sure i understand. Did you test with new reagents and now everything is fine? Or am I misundetstanding?

I did NOT test with a new reagent.
I tested with the same reagent as I have in the past.

I only posted my most recent testing (8.0 dKH) to show that a) the test kit was able to measure scores above 6.0, and b) that the dosing of baking soda has worked.

Any NEW tests will be from a new reagent. As I mentioned before I will test a new batch of mixed saltwater (using the same bucket of salt) when my current supply runs out.

I will post the test result here and if it again has a low alkalinity, I will make sure to bring a sample to a LFS before any dosing of baking soda.

Hope I explained myself clearly.

 

[Lou Ekus]

I did NOT test with a new reagent.
I tested with the same reagent as I have in the past.

I only posted my most recent testing (8.0 dKH) to show that a) the test kit was able to measure scores above 6.0, and b) that the dosing of baking soda has worked.

Any NEW tests will be from a new reagent. As I mentioned before I will test a new batch of mixed saltwater (using the same bucket of salt) when my current supply runs out.

I will post the test result here and if it again has a low alkalinity, I will make sure to bring a sample to a LFS before any dosing of baking soda.

Hope I explained myself clearly.

Got it now....thanks for the clarification. Let me know what you find, when you do that new testing. Thanks again.

 

[Lou Ekus]

I did NOT test with a new reagent.
I tested with the same reagent as I have in the past.

I only posted my most recent testing (8.0 dKH) to show that a) the test kit was able to measure scores above 6.0, and b) that the dosing of baking soda has worked.

Any NEW tests will be from a new reagent. As I mentioned before I will test a new batch of mixed saltwater (using the same bucket of salt) when my current supply runs out.

I will post the test result here and if it again has a low alkalinity, I will make sure to bring a sample to a LFS before any dosing of baking soda.

Hope I explained myself clearly.

I hope you have found, by now, that the alkalinity was actually correct in your mix. I did now get results back from our batch testing and we found 7.4 and 7.8 dkH in this batch. Do you have any new results with some other alkalinity test yet? THANKS!

 

[Gaspipe]

Finally made a new batch of saltwater.

Alkalinity: 6.2dKH
Salinity: 34.7
Temp: 67.8

I will try and have this water tested at my LFS as a 2nd comp.
Also be aware that this is the 2nd reagent I have used for alkalinity.

 

[Gaspipe]

I hope you have found, by now, that the alkalinity was actually correct in your mix. I did now get results back from our batch testing and we found 7.4 and 7.8 dkH in this batch. Do you have any new results with some other alkalinity test yet? THANKS!

Hi Lou, I'm sorry, I just saw this post because I was updating this thread.

I made a new batch, using my test kit and this is what I have found:
Alkalinity: 6.2dKH
Salinity: 34.7
Temp: 67.8

I will try and run to the LFS for a 2nd test and report the results here once that is done.

-Gaspare

 

[Gaspipe]

So last week I went to my LFS and he tested the new batch of SW I made...

Alkalinity: 7.0
Salinity: 1.026

 

[JNalley]

So last week I went to my LFS and he tested the new batch of SW I made...

Alkalinity: 7.0
Salinity: 1.026

7 is exactly where it's supposed to be. TMPR mixes to between 7 and 8, but usually in the low 7's, so you're spot on. All of this was out of the same bucket?

 

[jrill]

So last week I went to my LFS and he tested the new batch of SW I made...

Alkalinity: 7.0
Salinity: 1.026

perfect

 

[Harold999]

Tip of the day: use only 25ml or the 30ml in the reagent.

Since i shake reagents before and after use i can use every single drop without issue's. Oh and leave caps of as short as possible.

 

[Gaspipe]

7 is exactly where it's supposed to be. TMPR mixes to between 7 and 8, but usually in the low 7's, so you're spot on. All of this was out of the same bucket?

So yes all the tests are from the same bucket of saltwater.

The 7.0 was done at the LFS on Sunday Feb 27th. Today I tested my bin again.

Test 1 with my previous reagent: 6.2
Test 2 with a new reagent: 7.0

I'm a bit confused. I have the Hanna dKH tester and I have used 3 different reagents. This most recent reagent netted me the same result as the LFS result.

Either way, I just want an accurate test result to know what I should be doing.

I want to especially thank @Lou Ekus for all his support and help during this. I'm looking fwd to buying my next batch of TPPR salt

-Gaspare

 

[DiLos Reef]

Baking Soda = Sodium Bicarbonate = Raise Alk without affecting pH
Baked Baking Soda = Soda Ash = Sodium Carbonate = Raise Alk AND pH

technically both affect pH to some small degree, one just does it much less so than the other.

This is absolute money!!! tried the slow and steady raise by adding to ro top off. went from 5.6 kh to 6.8 in 3 months.