Two part chemical sources

[ChrisH]

Having just acquired a Neptune DOS, I have to find the two-part solutions to use in it. In the USA this looks easy, from BRS. But here in the UK finding a decent supply of calcium chloride and sodium carbonate through an aquarium shop is proving difficult (at least, I'm failing to find one). Liquid are easy, but very expensive ...

So I assume just buying food grade chemicals by the kilo from chemical suppliers is the way to go (unless someone has other advise) and use these to mix a 'standard' solution to use in the DOS going forward. My question seemed to port across chemistry and Neptune, so apologies if this is in the wrong place, but if I'm correct so far, what is the recommended concentration to mix up? XX grams of calcium, YY grams of carbonate per litre? Any suggestions or advice are welcome please. That could even include anyone in the UK who has already solved this, sharing their source of buying chemicals.

 

[Crabs McJones]

If 2 part is difficult to acquire in your area, check out this thread by our very own @Randy Holmes-Farley on how to make your own 2 part solution out of household items or easily gotten items

http://reefkeeping.com/issues/2006-02/rhf/index.php

 

[beaslbob]

If 2 part is difficult to acquire in your area, check out this thread by our very own @Randy Holmes-Farley on how to make your own 2 part solution out of household items or easily gotten items

http://reefkeeping.com/issues/2006-02/rhf/index.php

agree.

here in the US calcium chloride is used to harden concrete at lower temperatures. So most redimix concrete have 25-50 pound bags for like $20US or so.
I also use baking soda which is sodium bicarbonate. Just plane old arm and hammer stuff from grocery stores. You can also bake it to form sodium carbonate.

IME the really hard chemical was magnesium chloride. It is used for dust control at land scaping but that is not a reliable source. I finally found a local industrial chemical supplier that would ship in 50 pound bags from another location and not charge shipping. like $20 US or so.

This stuff was so cheap I gave it away at local club meetings. 50 pound bags would last a decade or two. I did find it bleached the carpet in our car so I recommend putting them in a garbage bag to contain any spills.

Best of luck.

my .02

 

[ChrisH]

That looks really useful at a first glance - thanks for the pointer. Finding sources of chemicals doesn't seem too difficult; it was knowing what concentrations to mix at was harder. Thanks for your time in replying - it's much appreciated

 

[ChrisH]

Here's an added question. The link gives really good information about what to buy and how to prepare the dosing liquids, in two options for recipies. One uses baking soda (sodium bicarbonate) and heats it, the other just uses the bicarbonate. It says the first will elevate pH, the second slightly depresses it.

I looked up what heat does to bicarbonate - it turns it into sodium carbonate. So why not buy sodium carbonate in the first place? Same price from the supplier I have found and it would save the trouble of heating in an oven. Or am I missing something?

 

[beaslbob]

Here's an added question. The link gives really good information about what to buy and how to prepare the dosing liquids, in two options for recipies. One uses baking soda (sodium bicarbonate) and heats it, the other just uses the bicarbonate. It says the first will elevate pH, the second slightly depresses it.

I looked up what heat does to bicarbonate - it turns it into sodium carbonate. So why not buy sodium carbonate in the first place? Same price from the supplier I have found and it would save the trouble of heating in an oven. Or am I missing something?

Check again it's actually sodium carbonate.

And you can use sodium carbonate instead of baking sodium bicarbonate.

 

[ChrisH]

Thanks, though I'm a bit confused ... the instructions say to take baking soda (which is food grade, sodium bicarbonate) and heat it, turning it into sodium carbonate (recipe 1). Or baking soda without heating (recipe 2). But it seems we are on the same page that sodium carbonate can be used in recipe 1 without going through the heating process, as long as it is pharma/food grade. It's hard to find in the UK, but a whole lot lower cost than alternatives.

 

[redfishbluefish]

Does not need to be pharmaceutical grade....food grade is just fine. If you do use sodium carbonate, and follow Randy's formula, it's 2 cups to a gallon.

 

[ChrisH]

Thanks for the guidance - it's appreciated

 

[Kyuss414]

Be aware the measurement is going to be quite different from Randy's recipe that states the measurement for bicarbonate. I'll let Randy tell you even though he's not here.

 

[ChrisH]

As near as I can work out, recipe 1 uses 594g of baking soda = bicarbonate and heats it, turning it into carbonate by driving off water and CO2, making it lighter (unstated the final weight). But recipe 2 uses 297g of bicarbonate (so, to all effect, half) without heating.

Randy suggests that the first recipe is the more popular (because it raises pH?), and I was aiming for that ... but trying to work out if I could skip the heating stage by buying food grade carbonate in the first place. I'd have guessed at using around 300g of carbonate but I should do the experiment with heating the bicarbonate and seeing what weight I end up with.

I've found this whole thing to be both confusing and interesting. Looking at 'aquarium sources' for KH in the UK, where bulk supply like that at BRS doesn't seem available (it is, by going directly to lab suppliers like this one: https://www.intralabs.co.uk/sodium-bicarbonate/4kg-sodium-bicarbonate.html), it is sometimes difficult to understand the rationale.

Example. Red Sea I would trust, but nowhere do I find anything to tell me what chemical is actually in the KH powder, bicarbonate or carbonate. Foundation B costs around GBP24 per kilo. I have no idea if there are added trace elements.

Aquaforest sells at around GBP29 for 5kg and tells me it is bicarbonate. From the link above, bicarbonate food grade costs GBP8.65 for 4kg, a substantial saving. There are more, though not many in powder form, but using just these examples that makes Red Sea an unknown chemical for 24.0/kg, Aquaforest bicarb 5.80/kg and Intralabs food grade bicarb 2.16/kg (I've ignored postage cost). Perhaps I'd better just use bicarb and recipe 2 ...

 

[Kyuss414]

Yup the purpose of using carbonate over bicarbonate is for the PH raising affect of the sodium carbonate. It's generally dosed at night as the PH in your system drops when lights are off since the algae in coral is consuming less C02 in the water then (hence lowering PH,) so the PH raising effect keeps it from dropping as low, resulting in a more stable PH throughout a 24 hour period. A popular method is to dose the alkalinity component during the night, and the calcium component during the day since that component doesn't affect PH, and you want to give some time between dosing the two components to avoid precipitation.

As stated in the post I quoted from Randy above, for Recipe 1 you end up with 375 grams of sodium carbonate after heating the 594 grams of sodium bicarbonate. So if you buy sodium carbonate from the start, for recipe 1 just use 375 grams. Randy was the pioneer on this so sources like BRS weren't readily available here either, they came after. Hence the reason his original recipe includes the part about baking bicarbonate to turn it to carbonate - because sodium bicarbonate is easily found at grocery stores, commonly sold as baking soda (not baking powder.) This is actually what I still use.

Keep in mind recipe 2 is half as potent as recipe 1, so to raise alkalinity & calcium a given amount you are adding double the amount of the components, which means you're mixing it more often. The alkalinity part also will somewhat lower PH so you would want to do it at the peak during the day. Generally people have problems keeping the PH up in the first place so this method isn't as popular. It is handy to have some on hand though in case you need to make a large adjustment outside of your normal dosing (for instance, you weren't dosing enough and your dKH drifted down over time.) So you would adjust your dosing (which is using recipe 1, sodium carbonate) for the increased daily demand, but then use the sodium bicarbonate (recipe 2) to raise the range in which is sits. That way you aren't upsetting the PH balance with large doses of sodium carbonate only.

Also, in case you haven't come across it yet, JDiecks Reef Chemistry Calculator is extremely helpful for finding out how much you need to dose of a given solution to raise Alk/Cal/Mag a given amount. Among a bunch of others, Randys recipe 1 & 2 are present. Just keep in mind the volume is actual water volume.

Hope that helps!

 

[ChrisH]

That does help indeed - my thanks for your time in writing it. Finding a supplier of food grade sodium carbonate in the UK is turning into a difficult search (calcium chloride is easy, bicarbonate is easy .. carbonate is elusive).

So, if I'm now dosing with bulk supplies of calcium and KH and magnesium (the latter manually, the former two using a Neptune Apex), that leaves trace elements. I get it that these would be replenished through water changes, but other than that do folk use a trace element additive as well?

 

[Dkeller_nc]

Some do, some don't. Kind of depends how OCD you are.

On the calculation thing, you can use the BRS calculators if you wish - they are based on Randy's formulas. Furthermore, you don't really need to worry about getting the mixtures exact, just close and repeatable. That's because the proper way to do this is to measure your tank's consumption of alkalinity and calcium over time, and adjust your dosing accordingly. Many, if not most, find that their tank doesn't consume alkalinity and calcium in a 1:1 ratio. That's not a problem - you're going for stability, not an equal volume of addition of parts 1 & 2.

 

[blasterman]

You don't need to heat baking soda. It's nice to have the benefit of raising pH, but it's not required.

Grocery store baking soda....get it...stop worrying about it. Unless you're dosing a lot of alk the improved pH spike is negligible at best. If you are pre-mixing it for auto dosing you lose the pH advantage anyways unless used immediately.

Magnesium chloride is typically used 1:1 with magnesium sulfate so neither chloride nor sulfate ions become too common - at least that's the theory. I use epson salts and don't worry about it. Water changes should resolve the chloride vs sulfate issue.

 

[rushbattle]

Sodium hydroxide raises pH farther than carbonate, and might be easier to find.

 

[ChrisH]

Again, thanks for all the advice and info. I haven't heard of using sodium hydroxide (instead of carbonate or bicarbonate ... or is this just an extra to boost pH, having already used one of the former)?

 

[rushbattle]

Here ya go:

New DIY Two Part Recipes with Higher pH Boost

Here's a first crack at what may end up being multiple possible recipes for a DIY two part that either has a higher pH or can be made more concentrated than traditional two part recipes. This one has about twice the pH raising effect compared to a carbonate based two part, per unit of...

www.reef2reef.com

 

[ChrisH]

That's quite a read ... starting on my second run through now ...

 

[Kyuss414]

Yeah recipe 1, recipe 2, and the new sodium hydroxide method are all different methods of dosing the same thing, with the PH spike from the alkalinity part of the different methods being the main net difference in the end.

There's also an potential for elevated sulfate levels from the recipe 1 & 2 method, if using the "B" method for mixing the magnesium component. So as to not muddy the waters here too much, it's generally best to stick to the "A" magnesium component for those recipes for this reason, and is comparable to the newer sodium hydroxide method in that regard.

So that said, basically sodium hydroxide (PH+++) >> sodium carbonate (PH++) >> sodium bicarbonate (PH-).

The bonus perk of the newer sodium hydroxide method being the magnesium is added with the calcium part, so it's not necessary to periodically dose it separately as with the older recipe 1 & recipe 2 method.

As for the part about trace elements, as said some do dose that as well, but I never found the need personally as I only keep softies & LPS (I love the movement,) so don't have any personal experience.