New to dosing kalkwasser

rushbattle · Jan 12, 2019

Tangina20 said:
I did a 15% water change yesterday and calcium only went up to 360 and alk is still st 7, I’m thinking about going to petco to get some sea chem reef advantage calcium and baking soda to raise the numbers until I figure out what I’m gonna do about dosing. Would you guys recommend I just bring calcium up to 400 right away or slowly over a few days??

Seems like a reasonable plan. If you are certain about salinity then I would do as you propose, over 2-3 days. What are you using to measure salinity, which kit for Alk and Ca, and what salt mix are you using?

Tangina20 · Jan 12, 2019

rushbattle said:
Seems like a reasonable plan. If you are certain about salinity then I would do as you propose, over 2-3 days. What are you using to measure salinity, which kit for Alk and Ca, and what salt mix are you using?

I’m using reef crystals for salt, api for test kits and a refractometer

rushbattle · Jan 12, 2019

Tangina20 said:
I’m using reef crystals for salt, api for test kits and a refractometer

Do you have a calibration solution for the refractometer and do you calibrate frequently? As someone who has been around marine systems for decades, and having been caught fixing symptoms and not the root cause, making sure you are starting with the simple things is important. I had a number of issues a few years ago, I couldn't figure out what was going on. Turns out my calibration solution was leaking and I was trying to figure out why my salinity was constantly changing.

RC mixes up way way high in Alk, Ca and Mg. I am surprised you are all the way down to 7dKH and 360ppm Ca. Hence the salinity questions.

If you are certain salinity measurement is correct, then I would still do some more water changes instead of raising the levels with Ca mixture and NaCO3. The reason is that if your other levels are so far from where they should be with that salinity, then Mg, and everything else is bound to be off a bit as well. And water changes generally don't hurt anything, unless you are bringing Nitrogen and Phosphorous too low, or salinity and temperature aren't proper.

If you don't feel like any more water changes, adding Ca and CO3 is the next best thing for sure.

Tangina20 · Jan 12, 2019

rushbattle said:
Do you have a calibration solution for the refractometer and do you calibrate frequently? As someone who has been around marine systems for decades, and having been caught fixing symptoms and not the root cause, making sure you are starting with the simple things is important. I had a number of issues a few years ago, I couldn't figure out what was going on. Turns out my calibration solution was leaking and I was trying to figure out why my salinity was constantly changing.

RC mixes up way way high in Alk, Ca and Mg. I am surprised you are all the way down to 7dKH and 360ppm Ca. Hence the salinity questions.

If you are certain salinity measurement is correct, then I would still do some more water changes instead of raising the levels with Ca mixture and NaCO3. The reason is that if your other levels are so far from where they should be with that salinity, then Mg, and everything else is bound to be off a bit as well. And water changes generally don't hurt anything, unless you are bringing Nitrogen and Phosphorous too low, or salinity and temperature aren't proper.

If you don't feel like any more water changes, adding Ca and CO3 is the next best thing for sure.

I did a homemade calibration solution With table salt and measured with a gram scale. I have a good bit of lps and a few sps and the sps hasn’t been doing so good. My monti cap hasn’t grown in 5 months and is white which red polyps. and I have 0 nitrate and phosphate due to a low bioload which made me want to start testing and found my cal and alk are low .

rushbattle · Jan 12, 2019

Tangina20 said:
I did a homemade calibration solution With table salt and measured with a gram scale. I have a good bit of lps and a few sps and the sps hasn’t been doing so good. My monti cap hasn’t grown in 5 months and is white which red polyps. and I have 0 nitrate and phosphate due to a low bioload which made me want to start testing and found my cal and alk are low .

All good info. I will try to address them if that helps. Keep in mind there are all sorts of ways to do these things, I am probably not the best to be helping but I will try.

That calibration fluid from Dr. H-F is great, so you should be good there. In that case, I stand by my water change suggestion. If levels are that far off of RC levels, it seems like a great idea to do something like 6 water changes of 15% over the next few weeks instead of adjusting everything separately. I suggest finding a way to supplement carbonates and Ca at the same time. Either a dosing pump with a high flow rate to dose kalkwasser separately from topoff, or a three part solution with NaCO3 on one doser, CaCl on another, and Mg and minor/traces on the third. The most cost effective of those is the Tropic Marin NaCl Free Salt.

Low N and P are a problem, but feeding more helps without a doubt. Just try to be consistent with feeding and watch your levels as you increase feeding rates. White corals are a bad sign, must be pretty low, get some food in there! Are you running GFO?

Tangina20 · Jan 12, 2019

rushbattle said:
All good info. I will try to address them if that helps. Keep in mind there are all sorts of ways to do these things, I am probably not the best to be helping but I will try.

That calibration fluid from Dr. H-F is great, so you should be good there. In that case, I stand by my water change suggestion. If levels are that far off of RC levels, it seems like a great idea to do something like 6 water changes of 15% over the next few weeks instead of adjusting everything separately. I suggest finding a way to supplement carbonates and Ca at the same time. Either a dosing pump with a high flow rate to dose kalkwasser separately from topoff, or a three part solution with NaCO3 on one doser, CaCl on another, and Mg and minor/traces on the third. The most cost effective of those is the Tropic Marin NaCl Free Salt.

Low N and P are a problem, but feeding more helps without a doubt. Just try to be consistent with feeding and watch your levels as you increase feeding rates. White corals are a bad sign, must be pretty low, get some food in there! Are you running GFO?

I’m just running a skimmer but i turned it off and set it to 12 hours a day to see if that helps. Why do you suggest water changes instead of dosing??

rushbattle · Jan 12, 2019

Tangina20 said:
I’m just running a skimmer but i turned it off and set it to 12 hours a day to see if that helps. Why do you suggest water changes instead of dosing??

Well, really I am suggesting both. Like I said before, I am worried that other elements are off as well like Mg, K, Sr, Br, etc. etc. In particular, if Mg is low you will struggle to get Ca and alkalinity up as it will just precipitate. But dosing what you can measure is just fine as well. Hope all goes well! :)

Tangina20 · Jan 12, 2019

rushbattle said:
Well, really I am suggesting both. Like I said before, I am worried that other elements are off as well like Mg, K, Sr, Br, etc. etc. In particular, if Mg is low you will struggle to get Ca and alkalinity up as it will just precipitate. But dosing what you can measure is just fine as well. Hope all goes well! :)

Awesome thank you for all of the help!!