I Would Love You Forever If...

[Servillius]

You set some sort of standard comparator for the various two part solutions out there. I suppose we can do the math, but each company offers its own choice of units and it gets a bit complicated.

Maybe just do the math for us once and report each in ppm or dKh/ml of standard solution or whatever works?

 

[dragon99]

That would be awesome! Some of the products (I'm looking at you brighwell) have the most confusing directions and complicated formulas for dosing.

For Alk/Ca this calculator has lots of products:
http://reef.diesyst.com/chemcalc/chemcalc.html

 

[themcfreak]

That would be awesome! Some of the products (I'm looking at you brighwell) have the most confusing directions and complicated formulas for dosing.

For Alk/Ca this calculator has lots of products:
http://reef.diesyst.com/chemcalc/chemcalc.html

I love this website. I use BRS 2 part, but this website still helps me figure out balanced solutions (if I have xx DKH, I should have xx calcium with it for balance).

 

[chipmunkofdoom2]

Maybe just do the math for us once and report each in ppm or dKh/ml of standard solution or whatever works?

It's worth noting that not all two-parts contain just calcium or carbonate alkalinity. Some include other trace elements, either as impurities or as intentional additions to add value to the product. While you might be able to compare the carbonate alkalinity content of one additive to another, you wouldn't be able to quantify the availability or unavailability of trace elements. An additive isn't necessarily worse if it contains less calcium because it also contains additional trace elements.

If you'd like to do the math to just figure out which supplement has more alkalinity, magnesium, or calcium though, you can. Pick a theoretical tank volume (say, 100 gallons). Pick a theoretical dosing scenario for an element (say your calcium is 440 ppm and you want to take it to 450 ppm). Then, choose a dosing supplement, say Aquaforest's Ca liquid. The calculator above says you need 37.8 ml. Then, change the dropdown to something like TLF's two part. The calculator then says you need 100 mL to get the same increase. If this calculator is correct, it would appear that Aquaforest's Ca additive is three times more concentrated than TLF's. But, this doesn't include price. If TLF's calcium is a quarter of the price, it's a better deal. This also doesn't account for things like trace elements, but it's a basic scenario.

If you really wanted to see what the concentration of these chemicals are, you could use one of the hypothetical scenarios above and plug the numbers into the equation below:

The volumes, such as tank volume and dosing volume, must be in the same units (this means converting the dose to gallons, or the tank volume to mL). The tank concentration and the dosage concentration must also be in the same units, be it ppm, mg/L, meq/L or dKh. Using the equation above, we find that Aquaforest's calcium additive has about 100,600 ppm calcium, while TLF's additive only has about 38,000 ppm calcium.

 

[Servillius]

Thanks all. I appreciate all the help doing the math, but this leaves two problems.

First, the calculator has a limited set of information, and second, it’s a bit of work doing the research then doing the math.

My grocery tells me how many cents per ounce I’m paying for different brands of peanuts. I love BRS exactly because they’re the kind of retailer that appreciates the value of that clear information and makes it available to us buyers!