After reading:
Here are my takeaways:
My ASW has a dKH of 7.5ish and a Ca level of 450ppm. So after 180 days, the tank would be about 510ppm and in my opinion in need of adjustment.
A couple of questions:
Here are my takeaways:
- For most practical purposes, Ca and Alk are consumed equally.
- However, "...the demand for calcium and alkalinity may not be precisely balanced at 20 ppm calcium per 1 meq/l of alkalinity..."
- The biggest impact to balance will mostly depend on the uptake of Mag/Stro in the formation of coral which will differ in each tank.
- "According to the ESV website, the two-part system B-ionic has a balance of 19.3 ppm calcium per 1 meq/L of alkalinity."
My ASW has a dKH of 7.5ish and a Ca level of 450ppm. So after 180 days, the tank would be about 510ppm and in my opinion in need of adjustment.
A couple of questions:
- How does one best lower Ca? (Larger water changes with a lower Ca ASW works, but I'm not interested in large water changes or changing up my salts)
- Should Ca be corrected before one gets to 500ish? Is there a benefit to correcting earlier?
- Can you let the tank auto-correct through a precipitation event if you are auto-dosing Alk?
- Ca testing is notoriously prone to error, but can one be successful using Ca instead of Alk for dosing? If so how? Can it be automated?