Redsea B Stock Solution Help

Neil Cohen · Oct 22, 2021

I am switching to Redsea powder, mixed as a stock solution at Redsea's suggested mix. All the calculators I see are either for liquid only or for powder. My tank's net water volume is 95 gallons, mixed reef with mostly softies (zoas, leathers, a couple of sps frags). Avg consumption is 1.4 dKh per day.

My question is, since the powder mixes at 1/3 the dKh of the liquid, do I just triple what the calculator says for the liquid? Seems logical but then it seems highly excessive. I know I can just start with that and watch consumption over the days but I am trying to get everything super stable, which is why I want to dose the stock solution spread out over 24 hours. And I am afraid of missing a decimal and killing everything.

Any help would be greatly appreciated.

blaxsun · Oct 22, 2021

It's a really interesting question. What I found in attempting to do this with the Nyos alkalinity powder equivalent was that I simply couldn't dissolve 3x the suggested amount in RO water. I ended up having to add 3x the water to get everything to dissolve.

What's interesting is that the Red Sea calcium and magnesium Foundation elements actually yield a higher ppm than the liquid version. It must have something to do with being unable to supersaturate alkalinity in the same way.

So switching to powder from liquid means you'll use about 25% less calcium and magnesium and 300% more alkalinity!

Neil Cohen · Oct 22, 2021

Interesting, indeed. Yes, I read that the problem is that you can’t get more powder to dissolve. Curious what process they use to get the liquid to be higher and stable.

bothersome that Redsea doesn’t even help with calculations of stock solution.

everything on their site says stock solution is 1/3 the potency of the liquid but I was still anxious about just tripling it.

Neil Cohen · Oct 22, 2021

And I was switching to the stock solution because is it diluted, so I can distribute the dosing times and not fall below 2ml per dose, as I see my doser not being as accurate with amounts around 1ml and lower.