Just say NO to magnesium testing: RMM is born

[Blopple]

I feel so validated. First tank, new tank, never tested Mg. Was starting to feel guilty about it.

I will proudly tell people I use RMM for Mg when they ask, bahaha.

 

[Randy Holmes-Farley]

Is testing your salt mix once per batch of slat allowed under RMM or are the test so inaccurate it doesn’t matter anyway. I am convinced I got a low batch of mag IO salt but who knows

I'd personally figure out what the manufacturer puts in it (perhaps from reliable ICP testing of other folks batches, and assume that is always there, rather than testing. Adjust the amount as needed.

 

[Randy Holmes-Farley]

I will proudly tell people I use RMM for Mg when they ask, bahaha.

I just googled RMM to see what actually comes up.

"Remote Monitoring and Management"

Perfect. We remotely monitor and manage it by not testing and assuming it is fine.

 

[Randy Holmes-Farley]

So @Randy Holmes-Farley , do you think that the importance of Mg in stabilizing supersaturated Ca in saltwater is overstated and risks of precipitation from Mg too low are actually not worth thinking about too much?

Quantifying that effect is difficult, but I am of the opinion that the effect of magnesium is not as strong as organics/organisms and maybe not as much as phosphate when these are higher.

Obviously new salt water and new tanks have plenty of magnesium, but may lack these other two. They are both much more prone to calcium carbonate precipitation than well established reef tanks, and the new salt water the most so.

I can only think that is due to organics (including whole bacteria) and maybe phosphate. The magnesium, even high values such as in red sea coral pro (they claim 1390 ppm at 35 ppt) fails to prevent their own claimed issue of precipitation.

So yes, I think many people have an excessively high expectation of the effect of magnesium, and that is not surprising since there are really no tests to evaluate this effect and it has been widely stated for decades.

IMO, it is real and important, but differences between 1250 and 1350 ppm are not critical in this context.

 

[paintman]

Randy Holmes Farley! Single handedly reducing the profits of Salifert and Reef Moonshine one post at a time. LOL!

 

[Miami Reef]

I threw out my Red Sea Magnesium Pro and Salifert Magnesium test. I never trusted them, and I never benefited from trying to ”control” magnesium. It always shows around 1400ppm. I love this RMM!

 

[TokenReefer]

Haven't tested Mg in a long time. Glad to see I'm not the only one. Now I don't have to feel guilty about it lol. This is great!

 

[Reefer Matt]

I use Neptune Tridents for mg testing and just look at the trends rather than focusing on holding the number. But if mg testing is so inaccurate, how can we be sure the salt mix has the proper amount to begin with?

 

[JulesH]

What's magnesium?

 

[Idech]

Sold ! I won’t be testing it anymore.

 

[Shawnman]

Testing Hanna alk, red sea calcium and aqua forest mag. My testing data consistently shows mag being low. I recently started dosing alk with a dosing pump so that's being stable dosing 3 ml daily in a 26 gal nano. I dose maybe 10 ml ca every 3 weeks and red sea mag 120 ml every 2 weeks approximately to maintain 9 alk, 450 ca, and 1350 mag. My tank seems it needs more mag than anything. What am I missing? All this testing is a pita.

 

[DenverSaltyFarm]

So what do we do if we don’t do water changes?

 

[Randy Holmes-Farley]

Testing Hanna alk, red sea calcium and aqua forest mag. My testing data consistently shows mag being low. I recently started dosing alk with a dosing pump so that's being stable dosing 3 ml daily in a 26 gal nano. I dose maybe 10 ml ca every 3 weeks and red sea mag 120 ml every 2 weeks approximately to maintain 9 alk, 450 ca, and 1350 mag. My tank seems it needs more mag than anything. What am I missing? All this testing is a pita.

Have you ever tried that kit on new salt water?

It is impossible for magnesium consumption in ppm to be even half of the calcium consumption.

Anyway, this is the reason for RMM: to avoid impossible scenarios driven by kit issues.

 

[Randy Holmes-Farley]

So what do we do if we don’t do water changes?

Use a balanced additive with sufficient magnesium.

If you do icp, use a quality place like Oceamo. I would not go without water changes unless I could see what was happening to ions you have no kits for.

 

[taricha]

So yes, I think many people have an excessively high expectation of the effect of magnesium, and that is not surprising since there are really no tests to evaluate this effect and it has been widely stated for decades.

IMO, it is real and important, but differences between 1250 and 1350 ppm are not critical in this context.

Thanks. That was a really interesting answer, that I didn't expect - organics might be more useful in keeping precipitation at bay.
To drill down, do you think it's more organics in the water that prevents the Ca from falling out, or more that the organics in the everpresent biofilms act against precipitation by preventing it on the surfaces.

Funny, even the test kits I used for years said test Mg first, because if it's low you want to adjust it up before you add Alk or Ca - based on the theory it prevents the precipitation.

 

[DenverSaltyFarm]

Use a balanced additive with sufficient magnesium.

If you do icp, use a quality place like Oceamo. I would not go without water changes unless I could see what was happening to ions you have no kits for.

Thank you. I’ve been doing the reef moonshiners program so there are frequent ICP tests along with Hanna and the Hanna test is very bad, results all over the place. I’ll just keep dosing with the brs calcium, alk, and mag along with the shine andd should get a good feel for how much the tank consumes.

 

[Randy Holmes-Farley]

Thanks. That was a really interesting answer, that I didn't expect - organics might be more useful in keeping precipitation at bay.
To drill down, do you think it's more organics in the water that prevents the Ca from falling out, or more that the organics in the everpresent biofilms act against precipitation by preventing it on the surfaces.

Funny, even the test kits I used for years said test Mg first, because if it's low you want to adjust it up before you add Alk or Ca - based on the theory it prevents the precipitation.

Organics binding to the CaCO3 surface and poisoning it from acting as a site for additional precipitation. Same as magnesium does.

I demonstrated this myself with sodium polyacrylate that I knew would bind. I took two test tubes, one with tank water and one with tank water plus the polymer. Then I added the alk part of Bionic until precipitation took place. The polymer one went very high while the other rapidly precipitated. I expect little proto crystals if CaCO3 were coated and prevented from growing.

 

[Garf]

Is there a badge for RMM. If so I’m in. Otherwise I’ll just continue to test it every six months or so.

 

[Kfactor]

my mag seems to drop fast on me i dont know why i dont even have that many corals

 

[Garf]

my mag seems to drop fast on me i dont know why i dont even have that many corals

Magnesium testing is “iffy”.

Edit - Double check salinity.