Say you could slowly dose dry calcium hydroxide (kalk) in a reef tank water mixing chamber.....

[Lousybreed]

Ok please hear me out. Let’s just say you found this amazingly precise dry powder metering gizmo where you could fill a small hopper with dry kalk (aka calcium hydroxide) and it would meter the powder into a mixing chamber that contained your reef tank water. @Randy Holmes-Farley I know you mentioned if you dumped it in too fast it would cause precipitation of mag and whatnot due to the massive spike in pH. If you assume you have a slow addition all day long and your flow rate in your mixer was 500gph.....is this something that could possibly work?

 

[xxkenny90xx]

When you mix kalk you get an unusable sediment at the bottom of the container. If you mix the kalk in your tank then that sediment would stay in your tank which wouldn't be ideal imo

 

[Lousybreed]

When you mix kalk you get an unusable sediment at the bottom of the container. If you mix the kalk in your tank then that sediment would stay in your tank which wouldn't be ideal imo

Not sure if you can compare the two. The sediment you are referring to is the surface “ice” that forms in as CO2 in the air reacts with the kalk.....when kalk is dosed in the aquarium you don’t see that deposit so I am assuming you would not see that with dosing direct....BUT I really don’t know either.

 

[xxkenny90xx]

I believe there are impurities that normally settle on the bottom of my ato. You'll be adding these directly to your tank. But I doubt that would hurt anything. I would think the biggest risk would be that before the kalk is fully mixed in it could get on your corals and kill them. Dosing it in your sump should get rid of that risk though.

This is just the way I understand it though

So with the proper precautions and high quality kalk (with less impurities) I think your good to go!

 

[Lousybreed]

Thanks. The more I think about this the more I like it. I will probably dose a suspension of kalk in RODI that is held in suspension via mechanical mixing (aka a power head or pump) and then dosed to the tank. Saturated kalk contains only 1.73 grams per liter. So even if your suspension is only at 10 grams per liter you are able to put more kalk in your system and not have to rely on massive evaporation to keep up with your alk consumption

 

[BradB]

Possible in theory but not feasible in practice. If you really invested in this, you could take over the market from 2 part dosing, calcium reactors and Neptune tridents. But it would take a lot more work than anything worth doing for your own tank.

 

[Lousybreed]

Possible in theory but not feasible in practice. If you really invested in this, you could take over the market from 2 part dosing, calcium reactors and Neptune tridents. But it would take a lot more work than anything worth doing for your own tank.

Why do you say this? Have you tried?

 

[Lousybreed]

The reason I ask is this is what the back of my head is saying that this cannot be possible as someone would be doing it.

 

[xxkenny90xx]

The reason I ask is this is what the back of my head is saying that this cannot be possible as someone would be doing it.

Fwiw I came across a thread where someone asked the same question a long time ago and I recall randy holmes farley saying that it is relatively safe to do

 

[Garf]

When treating Aiptasia with a concentrated Kalk paste you get lots of white floating particles. I think this may have a similar effect.

 

[saltybees]

Where’s the mixer? Is the hopper just dumping into your sump? Or a separate solution made daily then added?

 

[saltybees]

Probably would work fine but I’d be concerned about precip and the solution weakening if it’s constantly being mixed in an unsealed container from the exposure to co2.

 

[HuduVudu]

This thread might be interesting to you.

Soda poppin' ... and how to dose infinite Kalk

Ok, how I arrived at this crazy simple stupid idea was kinda like this: It started a long time ago when wet dry filters were still dominant and only the cool kids built Berlins. I had gotten back into the hobby after being in the Philippines and I was absolutetly enamored with live coral, I...

www.reef2reef.com

 

[stanlalee]

Explain why you would prefer this to a kalk reactor which is the exact same thing but mixed with RODI water instead?

 

[HuduVudu]

CaRxs don't really work well on 20 gallon tanks.

 

[Imaexpat2]

Been using Kalkwasser for ever since I got in this hobby. I currently use Kalk +2 in my tanks for all make up water that I drip from a reptile dripper container like an IV. This is a most excellent way to get it in your tank slowly so you dont send your PH through the roof! I typically drip Kalk at night time when the lights are off and the PH drops off anyways, this way my PH stays a little more consistently stable.

With Kalk you have to mix with water and allow it to sit 12-24 hours so all the impurtities in it settle to the bottom. Yes there will be a surface slick that forms. You want to use the clear liquid inbetween these two. I use one of those glass lemonaid jugs with the spigot on it in a 2 gallon jug. This allows me to easily get the clear liquid out and not get any impuritites in the process and is the easiest technique I have found to date. Its yet to fail me...

 

[Lousybreed]

When treating Aiptasia with a concentrated Kalk paste you get lots of white floating particles. I think this may have a similar effect.

when added too fast you are correct. Think a paste like 5 times thinner than a true paste and dripped at the rate of 1 drip every 20 seconds. I am worried about the dosing pump line getting plugged, with enough flow I am hoping to not get precipitation.

 

[Lousybreed]

Explain why you would prefer this to a kalk reactor which is the exact same thing but mixed with RODI water instead?

My uptake is too much. Meaning I would actually have to add more kalk water to keep up with my alk uptake than my evaporation rate would allow for.

 

[Lousybreed]

This thread might be interesting to you.

Soda poppin' ... and how to dose infinite Kalk

Ok, how I arrived at this crazy simple stupid idea was kinda like this: It started a long time ago when wet dry filters were still dominant and only the cool kids built Berlins. I had gotten back into the hobby after being in the Philippines and I was absolutetly enamored with live coral, I...

www.reef2reef.com

I appreciate it, but I am not interested. I want to get rid of all carbonic acid. It would be too expensive at my system size (700 gallons). I am setting up my experiment right now!

 

[stanlalee]

Being a Reg Nurse I've found bolus feeding tube bags to be most wonderful for dripping kalk. Comes with a nice roller clamp to adjust drip rate and an air tight cap to maintain the integrity of the kalk in the bag. I only drip at night to maintain pH. I use polyp lab one (calcium/magnesium acetate) for primary cal/alk/mg