Bolus dosing

[Randy Holmes-Farley Verified Community Expert]

Does it help sell the idea that the expected dose of alk was supposed to raise the tank to xxx but instead some of it will be released slowly throughout the day?

I do think garfs idea that perhaps the bolus or light blast or both shocks the corals into not calcifying for a number of hours, causing alk to plateau and pH to rise more than normal, along with the calculator issue, could potentially explain everything.

I have no idea if it is real, but that possibility matches all known chemical science and puts bolus dosing in a less than optimal light.

 

[rtparty]

I do think garfs idea that perhaps the bolus or light blast or both shocks the corals into not calcifying for a number of hours, causing alk to plateau and pH to rise more than normal, along with the calculator issue, could potentially explain everything.

I have no idea if it is real, but that possibility matches all known chemical science and puts bolus dosing in a less than optimal light.

Did you see the instruction and ingredient list Pod posted?

They are adding Trace 3 to the Carbonate Mix portion. This brings in potassium, fluorine, iodine, bromine, and some others. Are they claiming those could raise alkalinity?

 

[BeanAnimal]

The bromine (not sure about others) could allow a bit higher alk saturation in the solution but Randy would have to speak to the extent.

 

[Randy Holmes-Farley Verified Community Expert]

Did you see the instruction and ingredient list Pod posted?

They are adding Trace 3 to the Carbonate Mix portion. This brings in potassium, fluorine, iodine, bromine, and some others. Are they claiming those could raise alkalinity?

They said it was not the extra additives (which I presume means that stuff) and I don’t think the amount of that additive (25 mL of liquid which is added to 500 dry grams of the sodium bicarbonate) could possibly add much alkalinity, even if it was 50% sodium formate by weight.

 

[Pod_01]

I will go on a limb here and say that the claimed FM Alk is not there.

When I used FM Balling light I dosed approximately 70ml of Alk.

When I switched to TM Original Balling my dose is still approximately 70ml of Alk (Part B).

My math may have been wrong but when I was working out my dose on a napkin I calculated that I should have been dosing approximately 130ml of TM Original Balling to equal FM dose. I am quite sure there is no phantom Alk in TM Original Balling method. I am also sure there is no secret other element in TM Balling to bring in the phantom Alk.

I am just shocked that FM keeps sandbagging on this simple issue.
I don’t get the end game here…

 

[BeanAnimal]

I don't think there is an end game and maybe at this point the hole is too deep to stop digging and the hope (reality) is that his happy customer base doesn't care one way or the other.

Claude cites happy customers as a metric to judge his "science". While it may not correlate to proof of the science, he has proved that his customers don't care. As I said prior, it would appear that Doug is more or less one of those happy customers appears to talk over Claude's shoulder as an aligned "expert". Between the two of them they have a fan base and I suppose that is all that really matters if we are judging this from a business perspective and not a quality of science perspective.

He said several times that he has a reef water chemistry book coming out after Christmas. One can only hope that it is peer reviewed by somebody other than Doug or other's in their inner circle.

 

[Hans-Werner]

So he does insist it is bicarbonate with something special added.

The (not so) special thing I would add to a bicarbonate solution of a two-part-additive would be potassium bicarbonate.

It is not so magic, I guess everyone who wants to make a two part as balanced as possible has had this idea. But, well, it is not sodium bicarbonate only, it is a second "special" ingredient.

With a solubility of 3.3 mol/l (German Wikipedia, English Wikipedia says 2.2 mol/l) potassium bicarbonate is 3 (or 2) times better soluble than sodium bicarbonate with a solubility of just 1.1 mol/l. So you get some extra alkalinity in beyond the theoretical solubility of sodium bicarbonate only, or you improve the solubility a bit.

 

[Randy Holmes-Farley Verified Community Expert]

The (not so) special thing I would add to a bicarbonate solution of a two-part-additive would be potassium bicarbonate.

It is not so magic, I guess everyone who wants to make a two part as balanced as possible has had this idea. But, well, it is not sodium bicarbonate only, it is a second "special" ingredient.

With a solubility of 3.3 mol/l (German Wikipedia, English Wikipedia says 2.2 mol/l) potassium bicarbonate is 3 (or 2) times better soluble than sodium bicarbonate with a solubility of just 1.1 mol/l. So you get some extra alkalinity in beyond the theoretical solubility of sodium bicarbonate only, or you improve the solubility a bit.

Sure, there’s nothing wrong with adding some potassium bicarbonate. The FM product may contain it, although the mass based alk titration suggests if there is some, it’s a small amount. But the only thing that alters is the maximum solubility. It would actually reduce the weight based potency of the product. :)

At 100 g/L sodium bicarbonate of the FM recipe, there does not seem to be a severe conflict with the solubility at room temp, which is about 100 g/L.

https://www.researchgate.net/figure/Solubility-of-NaHCO-3-in-water-at-different-temperatures_tbl1_373180972

 

[Garf]

Sure, there’s nothing wrong with adding some potassium bicarbonate. The FM product may contain it, although the mass based alk titration suggests if there is some, it’s a small amount. But the only thing that alters is the maximum solubility. It would actually reduce the weight based potency of the product. :)

At 100 g/L sodium bicarbonate of the FM recipe, there does not seem to be a severe conflict with the solubility at room temp, which is about 100 g/L.

https://www.researchgate.net/figure/Solubility-of-NaHCO-3-in-water-at-different-temperatures_tbl1_373180972

I would also add that in a 2009 reef builders article (which appears to be near the beginning of Fauna Marin Balling Light), it is claimed there should always be an undesolved portion left over, after mixing.

Instructions for Fauna Marin’s new Light Balling method | Reef Builders | The Reef and Saltwater Aquarium Blog

The balling method is a popular method in which to provide your aquarium with calcium, magnesium, carbonate hardness and trace elements. However, strong lighting, stony coral husbandry and special…

search.app

 

[Hans-Werner]

I would also add that in a 2009 reef builders article (which appears to be near the beginning of Fauna Marin Balling Light), it is claimed there should always be an undesolved portion left over, after mixing.

Is this still the case? I haven't heard about problems with dissolution in a long time. Also heating/warming seems not to be necessary any more, is it?

Sodium bicarbonate is hard to dissolve near saturation. I always recommended to dissolve 1 mol/l to be on the save side.

 

[Garf]

Is this still the case? I haven't heard about problems with dissolution in a long time. Also heating/warming seems not to be necessary any more, is it?

Sodium bicarbonate is hard to dissolve near saturation. I always recommended to dissolve 1 mol/l to be on the save side.

Dunno, this whole thing is a bit messy, lol;

Thread 'Balling light dosing: product description vs Aquacalculator?' https://www.reef2reef.com/threads/balling-light-dosing-product-description-vs-aquacalculator.733898/

 

[Garf]

HI
You can follow the Aquacalculator App, it seemed that there was a mistake while made an update on our site.

Hi. i am sorry but this is not correct. The point is that you always get the same ammount of Calcium ! So you did not loose anything It is only a matter of the concentration of the stock solution you made. We are sorry we do an update at the Website and a older Version goes online. We will fix it asap

Hi there,
So after two years we have managed to update our dosage information. You can use the Aqua Calculator of course, and/or you can follow the informations on the products and on our website.

If you need support, please feel free to contact us! Either here in the forum or also gladly directly by email to: [email protected]

:)

 

[Randy Holmes-Farley Verified Community Expert]

I certainly agree that solubility limitations are a limiting concern with bicarbonate products, but I'm not really seeing that using potassium bicarbonate explains any of the major concerns with the Bolus method.

The on bucket potency that FM provides is higher than sodium bicarbonate can provide by a considerable margin (calculated earlier in this thread), and adding in potassium bicarbonate will only make that difference greater since potassium bicarbonate weighs more per unit of alkalinity.

The measured potency is consistent with sodium bicarbonate (and not the FM bucket claim), and not with a mixture of sodum and potassium bicarbonate, unelss the potassium is a quite minor fraction of the total (which may be true).

It also does not explain any delayed alk effect.

 

[Randy Holmes-Farley Verified Community Expert]

Hi there,
So after two years we have managed to update our dosage information. You can use the Aqua Calculator of course, and/or you can follow the informations on the products and on our website.

If you need support, please feel free to contact us! Either here in the forum or also gladly directly by email to: [email protected]

:)

I'm not sure where or when that was posted (reposted by GARF), but it is not currently correct based on the bucket details posted in this thread, and the alk titration of the product that I showed.

 

[Garf]

I'm not sure where or when that was posted (reposted by GARF), but it is not currently correct based on the bucket details posted in this thread, and the alk titration of the product that I showed.

There's a link in the post above. They seem to think the details below are accurate at that time;

 

[Randy Holmes-Farley Verified Community Expert]

The aquacalculator is a purchase product, so I did not check that

But on FM web site right now is this calculator, where they already supply incorrect text which matches the bucket claim earlier noted.

Fauna Marin Lab

high-level ICP, IP and titration water analysis

lab.faunamarin.de

"ALK/KH 10ml/100 Liter + 0,5 dkH"

That text from the calculator matches calculator result and the bucket claim, but in reality, there is only going to be 0.33 dKH from that addition based on measured alkalinity titration of the dry product.

I assumed there is no protected alkalinity in the product somehow. I do not see any possibly way there could be based on analysis of the product. Formate and other organics would show up by IR (they did not). The presence of formate would also reduce the immediate measured alk potency of the dry product since most of the formate will not be detected by an alk test (formate pKa is about 3.7, so an alk titration running down to the low 4's will miss more than half of it). Thus, the delayed alk cannot be from formate plus bicarbonate.

 

[BeanAnimal]

@Randy Holmes-Farley - was the alk component analysis done with the trace element mix included? I apologize if this was already covered.

 

[Randy Holmes-Farley Verified Community Expert]

@Randy Holmes-Farley - was the alk component analysis done with the trace element mix included? I apologize if this was already covered.

No, it was weighed out dry alk part added to pure water only. The type of test done (IR) doesn't work in water because water absorbs strongly. One can often see water peaks significant in even dry materials.

As to the alk testing of it, we can bookend what might possibly have been added from the trace addition by making an extreme (certainly false) assumption of what that is. It is a liquid, so lets assume it has 50% sodium formate by weight. Can't be calcium formate due to precipitation in the alk part.

How much alk could that possibly add (12.5 g of sodium formate (50% of the 25 mL added) in 5 L of solution that contains 500 g sodium bicarbonate).

500 g of sodium bicarbonate contains 5,950 millimoles of alkalinity

12.5 g of sodium formate contains 184 millimoles of alkalinity

The 5,950 mmoles in 5 L gives an alkalinity of 3,333 dKH of alk

The 184 mmoles in 5 L gives an alkalinity of 103 dKH of alk

Thus, in the recipe FM gives:

"ALK/KH 10ml/100 Liter + 0,5 dkH"

The alk dry product would add 0.33 dKH when dosed 10 ml in 100 L

The theoretical max amount in the trace additive if it is 50% by weight formate is an additional 0.01 dKH,

which does not significantly impact the overall amount of alk that is added.

The other bookend, obviously, is that it added none from the trace liquid.

 

[Garf]

In the old instructions the traces were added to calcium and magnesium, nothing in the Alk. I wonder why they changed that?

Edit - the magnesium traces are listed as "Iodine flour" whatever that means.

Edit - don't matter, I watched a 10 month old Balling light vid (well in the "Bolus" window) . Just bicarb, trace and "stabiliser". Usage recommended at 1 part calcium, 4 parts Alk.

Not "Flour", maybe Fluorine.

 

[Luminous74]

I am angry now. Couldn’t the calculator also just be a marketing gimmick? When you read on social media, many people say, “I dose 130 ml or 150 ml,” as if to express that their tank is thriving and their alkalinity consumption is high. This never made sense to me because, at most, the measured consumption might indicate how well the tank is doing. The amount dosed in milliliters is meaningless without the context of the water volume and the solution concentration. However, when a user posts somewhere, “I was dosing 90 ml with product XY, and since switching to Balling Light, I’m dosing 130 ml,” this becomes a positive marketing message. I hope you understand what I mean. With a deliberately inaccurate calculator, it suggests a higher consumption, which is interpreted as a positive signal.