Highest ALK for ulns

[NitrateKillah]

My current alk is 11.2, running full stream on CalRX. Can this be done? I notice people running ALK at 8 and below on theirs.

Will there be detrimental effects? why is 8 and below recommended? I am confused here, I thought 8.5 was most standard?

 

[pdxmonkeyboy]

I dont run ULNS but i know the most common alk is going to be around 8. Running alk that high is like playing with fire. Not only can you suffer burn...how do you get frags in to your system without shocking them?

 

[joseserrano]

Alk that high in a ulns would burn the corals

 

[AcroFan144]

I've seen a few of your posts regarding ULNS. Is there a reason you are 'insisting' on running it? What exactly are you trying to achieve?

My limited experience with ULNS ended in severe dinoflagellate bloom which ended in me tearing down the tank after a long battle. I would be very reluctant to try it again, seeing how I had much more success with keeping some nutrients in the tank: NO3 5-10, PO4 0.05-0.1

If you do try it, I wish you good luck and good coral growth!

 

[EMeyer]

Alk over 11? Why?

The ocean is 7 or a little lower, everywhere. Every time I've seen my alk creep above 8 I've seen detrimental effects on corals. I don't know where this recent trend toward high alk came from (did somebody make a popular YouTube video or something promoting high alk?)

I wouldnt worry about the unproven theory that nutrients and alk are related, which generally rests on a misunderstanding about how corals grow. Instead I'd just focus on gradually bringing your alk down closer to the alkalinity of the ocean.

 

[NitrateKillah]

I've seen a few of your posts regarding ULNS. Is there a reason you are 'insisting' on running it? What exactly are you trying to achieve?

My limited experience with ULNS ended in severe dinoflagellate bloom which ended in me tearing down the tank after a long battle. I would be very reluctant to try it again, seeing how I had much more success with keeping some nutrients in the tank: NO3 5-10, PO4 0.05-0.1

If you do try it, I wish you good luck and good coral growth!

I like the look of pastel colors. I seen how corals look when my N and P was low. But I had a massive break of dino's. Once my N/P was up, dino's were gone within a month or so.

I had a stag frag that paled out and died, I suspected it starved.

 

[NitrateKillah]

Alk over 11? Why?

The ocean is 7 or a little lower, everywhere. Every time I've seen my alk creep above 8 I've seen detrimental effects on corals. I don't know where this recent trend toward high alk came from (did somebody make a popular YouTube video or something promoting high alk?)

I wouldnt worry about the unproven theory that nutrients and alk are related, which generally rests on a misunderstanding about how corals grow. Instead I'd just focus on gradually bringing your alk down closer to the alkalinity of the ocean.

My CalRX is running full stream, its hard to dial it with out spending money on a Kamora.

 

[joseserrano]

My CalRX is running full stream, its hard to dial it with out spending money on a Kamora.

Lower bubble rate or hours regulator is on

 

[Ike]

I like the look of pastel colors. I seen how corals look when my N and P was low. But I had a massive break of dino's. Once my N/P was up, dino's were gone within a month or so.

I had a stag frag that paled out and died, I suspected it starved.

Pale, pastel corals aren't very healthy coral colors. But, if you really want that then ramp up your lighting schedule until your corals start to get pastel...

 

[pdxmonkeyboy]

The high alk fever was started from a BRS video that demonstrated faster growth....

 

[ReefPig]

The high alk fever was started from a BRS video that demonstrated faster growth....

Interestingly, their conclusion was that it may increase growth, but was inconclusive.

 

[Ike]

Interestingly, their conclusion was that it may increase growth, but was inconclusive.

Also, maintaining typically 6-7 dKH I've experienced growth faster than I could keep up with. There is so much that goes into growth, and you can have a lot of it and great. healthy colors with a range of dKH. What is tricky is to have high dKH and low nutrients to run into issues, the high dKH isn't necessarily the main issue, it's the nutrients, though everyone wants to make high dKH the problem.

 

[Acroalan]

My own experience over the last year has been that the two times my ALK got above 8 dkh I experienced tip burn on my acros. Once I got it slowly lowered back to close to 7 they started to recover. Mine is not a ULNS, but it happened both times I let my alk climb above 8.

 

[Rich Klein]

My current alk is 11.2, running full stream on CalRX. Can this be done? I notice people running ALK at 8 and below on theirs.

Will there be detrimental effects? why is 8 and below recommended? I am confused here, I thought 8.5 was most standard?

A calcium reactor lowers the tank's PH - the more you drip the lower the PH.

 

[jda]

...so much to unpack here.

First, 7.0 is where I keep my alk and even though I have .1n and .005p, my tank is anything but ULNS. ULNS usually required media and chemicals to drive values below NSW before you get burnt tips. Most people have no idea what ULNS even is, how to actually know if you have it and what to do about it... they just parrot that low residual levels are bad, when this is not even close to being true.

Your CaRx should run 24x7 at any level that you want. If you are getting inconsistent results, then you are doing something wrong - we can help with this if you let us know what the issue is, or there is a google doc linked on my signature that might help. If a CaRx is tuned well with no excess co2, then it will barely even move your tank pH, if at all - a poorly tuned reactor can drop the tank pH quite a bit.

 

[SeaDweller]

...so much to unpack here.

First, 7.0 is where I keep my alk and even though I have .1n and .005p, my tank is anything but ULNS. ULNS usually required media and chemicals to drive values below NSW before you get burnt tips. Most people have no idea what ULNS even is, how to actually know if you have it and what to do about it... they just parrot that low residual levels are bad, when this is not even close to being true.

Your CaRx should run 24x7 at any level that you want. If you are getting inconsistent results, then you are doing something wrong - we can help with this if you let us know what the issue is, or there is a google doc linked on my signature that might help. If a CaRx is tuned well with no excess co2, then it will barely even move your tank pH, if at all - a poorly tuned reactor can drop the tank pH quite a bit.

Then what would you consider your tank if those levels aren’t ULNS ?

 

[Spare time]

Alk over 11? Why?

The ocean is 7 or a little lower, everywhere. Every time I've seen my alk creep above 8 I've seen detrimental effects on corals. I don't know where this recent trend toward high alk came from (did somebody make a popular YouTube video or something promoting high alk?)

I wouldnt worry about the unproven theory that nutrients and alk are related, which generally rests on a misunderstanding about how corals grow. Instead I'd just focus on gradually bringing your alk down closer to the alkalinity of the ocean.

Alk can be much higher than 8. Almost all of the major salt brans have a high alk mixed designed for faster growth. I run my SPS LPS tank around 12.7 KH. You just have to provide the resouces to the coral for this sort of faster growth. If you have ultra low nitrate and phosphate and don't provide resources for soft tissue production then you get burnt tips. The key is providing enough flow and resources to sustain faster skeletal growth.

Just because the ocean alk is 7, doesn't mean that it has to be near that. What is natural is not necessarily ideal. That is the whole reason why it is a struggle to live in the wild. In our tanks, we do not relicated wild reefs. We strive for certain things and have the tools to remove the limitations on growth

 

[jda]

A normal reef tank, the way that they should be run? I feed a bunch and export a bunch and there is always a ton of available things for the corals that they actually want to use - ammonium/ammonia for nitrate and not no3. There is probably more available resources for coral in my tank than there is in most tanks with .5p and 50n.

Residual levels on a test kit are fools gold. Availability is the key, but you have to keep things from building up, so feeding a bunch and exporting a bunch are where the magic is made (yes, the old timers were always right). ULNS is NOT about residual levels, it is about limiting all kinds of things that are available, which most people need to never feed or use chemicals to achieve. ZeoVit is all about low residuals and huge availability and it is not even ULNS.

I am working on this document since most people do not understand availability versus residuals:

N & P

docs.google.com

FWIW- the higher N and P levels also inhibit calcification, which helps with burnt tips by slowing down skeletal growth.