Kalkwasser Reator??

[HawaiianReef]

What's the purpose of having a reactor for kalkwasser? Isn't that just an ato with kalkwasser in the reservoir?

David

 

[Montiman]

I love reactors there are several reasons why you may want them though I will also pump in using a dosing pump rather than the ATO as most people I know with reactors use a dosing pump rather than the ATO

1. With my reactor I add kalk about every 3 weeks and fill my ATO about once a week. It makes for less maintenance by not measuring kalk precisely ever since I just add a few scoops to the reactor without measuring and I don’t have to clean the ATO container since it never has kalk in it.
2. There is better consistency with the reactor. With a reactor and a dosing pump a precise amount of kalk is doses each day. You don’t have seasonal shifts due to evaporation and you can have it dose when you want like at night only to boost pH
3. It is safer. Almost all of the kalk crashes I have experienced or heard of have been because the kalk was linked to the ATO if the ATO fails your tank can die but also if you pull out some colonies to frag with a saw or bag up some frags for a friend or pull some rock out etc, and are not mindful the ATO will replace the water with kalk I have done this and accidentally dosed a gallon or more of kalk at once. There is also other problems like if a reactor tube pops off or an external pump or reactor leaks. If it puts 5-10 gallons on the floor it is bad but fixable but if your ATO puts 5-10 gallons of kalk in when the leak happens then it is really bad. You can always use a pH controller to help but because I like multiple levels of redundancy I prefer to have the dosing pump draw from my ATO water and go through a reactor so I no longer have dosing linked to my ATO

 

[NeedMoreReef]

reactor is easier than mixing and dripping Kalk each night. placing Kalk in your ATO ends up being messy and hard on the pump.