Quick Question on Carbon Dosing Vinegar

[GeoSquid]

I want to start carbon dosing and have been doing some research and had a question about getting started. Is this chart in milliliters/gal?
For instance, 100 gallons of water would start out with 4.8 ml/gal of vinegar per day and go up from there?

 

[Dan_P]

I want to start carbon dosing and have been doing some research and had a question about getting started. Is this chart in milliliters/gal?
For instance, 100 gallons of water would start out with 4.8 ml/gal of vinegar per day and go up from there?

Total daily dose.

Also note the error in the chart as you move from left to right starting with the week 2 row. The values are not scaled properly. This could result in never adding enough vinegar for larger systems

When you are nearing 1 mL/gal, a single dose might disturb the pH and upset your tank’s occupants. Such a large dose might be better split up to several per day. Around 1 mL/gal, vigorous bacteria growth, i.e., colorless slime, could become visible on surfaces.

 

[fryman]

When you are nearing 1 mL/gal, a single dose might disturb the pH and upset your tank’s occupants. Such a large dose might be better split up to several per day. Around 1 mL/gal, vigorous bacteria growth, i.e., colorless slime, could become visible on surfaces.

I agree, when approaching 1ml/gal a single dose would be a bad idea but even using a doser and spreading out the dose over the lighted period I found it affected my pH significantly. I recommend saturating the vinegar with kalk.

 

[GeoSquid]

I think I misquoted the chart. Is it saying, for the 100 gal example, that we should start adding 3.2 ml/100 gal a day? I estimate my water volume at about 150 gallons total removing volume of rock etc.. In reading the article this chart came from, he stated starting out with 15ml/100 gal a day to start then double it every week after. For my tank, that would be ~22ml of vinegar a day to start. I just started with 20ml a day yesterday to make it easy. Does this sound about right? 1ml/gal sounds excessive even at an ending amount. Should we be going that high? That would be 150ml of vinegar a day.

 

[fryman]

I think 20ml/ day to start sounds about right. Doubling every week seems a little aggressive to me but it could work if you keep a close eye on things.