What is your dosing schedule??

Eagle aquatics315 · Feb 2, 2018

I am curious as to how you guys (if you dose) keep you levels consistant (because consistency is key in this hobby) and what you guys do to maintain them, like your dosing schedule each day or however you guys do it. My reef tank has always been fine and thriving but I just cant seem to get my levels to stay consistant. Any suggestions? I do not have a dosing pump and I only dose calcium and magnesium by BRS. Thanks guys

Palyzoa · Feb 3, 2018

I use the jebao dosing pumps to dose All and Ca. It doses equal parts after the lights go out about 2 ml of Alk per at the top of every hour and 2 ml of Ca 30 mins after the Alk doses to avoid precipitation.

Why don't you dose any Alk?

saltyhog · Feb 3, 2018

I dose by dosing pumps controlled by my Apex. My total daily dosing is divided in to 24 doses, alkalinity at the top of every hour (24/7) and calcium at the bottom of the hour.

Mal11224 · Feb 3, 2018

I use a bubble magus doser for my tank and I set my schedule for 6 times per day with alk and calc alternating ever hour of the scheduled time. I used to do it every 24 hours but found better consistency using a 6 dose per day. I think this is something you have to play with a little to find what works. I use ESV for dosing and it works great for me.

Salt1972 · Feb 3, 2018

+1 We've been manually dosing BRS / Randy 2 Part for about 6 weeks. We added a Jebao DP4 this week after 2 weeks of testing. We view a doser like an autopilot on a boat or aircraft... you can steer either manually, but you can't do so as consistently as the machine.

We're fairly new to reefing. So, we tend to follow what others do and report here on R2R. Our 125g system requires 30mL Alk & Ca daily to maintain targets. We split that into 10 doses each and start at 10P for Alk & 10:30P for Ca hourly. So far, so good. We are still measuring Alk daily and Ca weekly to make sure. We see 8.2dKH and 450Ca consistently via Hanna's.

jerl77 · Feb 3, 2018

Apex dos pump
Best I ever owned

Water Dog · Feb 3, 2018

BRS dosers controlled by my Apex. 24/7 with Alk on the top of the hour and Ca 30 minutes later.

Programmed with a little help.

https://www.reeftronics.net/adpg/dosingcalc.php

Eagle aquatics315 · Feb 3, 2018

Palyzoa said:
I use the jebao dosing pumps to dose All and Ca. It doses equal parts after the lights go out about 2 ml of Alk per at the top of every hour and 2 ml of Ca 30 mins after the Alk doses to avoid precipitation.

Why don't you dose any Alk?

I could never figure it out for the life of me. No matter what I do it is always through the roof at around 13 to 14. My corals and fish dont seem to mind it and there are no burnt tips on any of my sps corals. So weird.

saltyhog · Feb 3, 2018

What salt are you using and what does the alkalinity measure in your newly made salt water?

XNavyDiver · Feb 3, 2018

Using the Apex DOS, I'm able to dose very small amounts throughout a 24 hr cycle.

PatW · Feb 3, 2018

The rule of thumb is you want your DKH to not move more than 1 unit per dosage. So when your coral uptake starts to go over .5 units, it is probably a good time to set up an automatic dosing schedule that will dose multiple times. I would set up the dosing a bit under the coral uptake and monitor ALK levels and hand dose the rest of the way.

Randy Holmes-Farley · Feb 3, 2018

Eagle aquatics315 said:
I could never figure it out for the life of me. No matter what I do it is always through the roof at around 13 to 14. My corals and fish dont seem to mind it and there are no burnt tips on any of my sps corals. So weird.

If you have no demand for alk, you also have no demand for calcium or magnesium.

Rick.45cal · Feb 4, 2018

I dose Tropic Marin balling solutions 24/7 using a Apex DOS, currently 325ml of each solution each day.

reefndude · Feb 4, 2018

I use brs dosing pumps controlled by a reedkeeper. Dose 17 times a day. Alk on the hour cal on the half hour.

PEP12 · Feb 4, 2018

I use 2 Apex DOS pumps which can dose in very small amounts if needed and 24\7 for multi doses for each element

madweazl · Feb 4, 2018

A pair of BRS pumps controlled by a Reef Angel Plus dose two part, 16 times daily (every 90 minutes). Roughly 28ml soda ash and 30ml calcium chloride daily.

Eagle aquatics315 · Feb 5, 2018

saltyhog said:
What salt are you using and what does the alkalinity measure in your newly made salt water?

I use fritz aquatics salt and I know for a fact it is 8.3 dkh.

saltyhog · Feb 5, 2018

How much are you dosing? Are you dosing one time a day? When are you testing in relationship to when your'e dosing?

Randy Holmes-Farley · Feb 6, 2018

Eagle aquatics315 said:
I use fritz aquatics salt and I know for a fact it is 8.3 dkh.

If you measured that yourself with the same kit that you measured much higher alk in the main tank, then there is some other source of alk.

The only substantial sources are:

1. Artificial rock that has not fully cured.
2. Additives that contain alk, even if you do not realize it or the manufacturer doesn't tell you (what are you adding?)
3. Top off water that contains alk somehow
4. Dosing nitrate regularly that gets consumed in the tank
5. You started the tank with a higher alk salt mix\