What brands of alkalinity, calcium, and magnesium are you using?

[hawkinsrgk]

But to state that the chemistry of currently available two part methods completely addresses the ionic imbalance created by the addition of calcium chloride and sodium bicarbonate is just not true to the actual chemistry of the resulting interaction

Are you saying there is an ionic imbalance because of missing sulfate or for some other reason?

This is not a setup just would like to understand this statement.

 

[Oberst Oswald]

Got me worried... 6 month old 65 gallon tank using Tropic Marin Bio-actif salt with BRS 2 part, 15% weekly water changes in a heavy mixed reef. 90% successful in coral and no loses with fish. Should I be adding any of these trace elements to my tank? I've been counting on the salt mix to take care of that, and so far all is well, but that is only because I'm over whelmed with all the additives available. I'd appreciate advice for recommended products.

 

[RobBaglieri]

Hey, you can but the powder form amd make a stock solution which is almost 3 gallons worth of alk. I just made a list with charts for dosing the stock solution.

 

[Lou Ekus]

Are you saying there is an ionic imbalance because of missing sulfate or for some other reason?

This is not a setup just would like to understand this statement.

Got me worried... 6 month old 65 gallon tank using Tropic Marin Bio-actif salt with BRS 2 part, 15% weekly water changes in a heavy mixed reef. 90% successful in coral and no loses with fish. Should I be adding any of these trace elements to my tank? I've been counting on the salt mix to take care of that, and so far all is well, but that is only because I'm over whelmed with all the additives available. I'd appreciate advice for recommended products.

I would love to discuss this further, but I'm sure I will be accused of trying to "push products" by other members. Please either give me a call in our office at 413-367-0101 or send me an email with your number and a good time to call you to [email protected]. I will be happy to explain the concepts that are basic to the Balling Method and to suggest products that might help in your specific situations.
Our office is closed this coming week, but if you leave a message with your number, I will try to get back to you before we return the following week.

 

[Randy Holmes-Farley]

@Randy Holmes-Farley

If you read my post carefully, you will see that I DID NOT say that "it cannot be done" in a two part system. What I said was that current good commercial two part systems do not compensate totally for the ionic imbalance. That they compensate for "some" of the trace elements in that imbalance. If the product just says that it includes all the "important" or "necessary" or "essential" trace elements, then it is making assumptions about which ones are important and not including all 70.

OK, so we are in agreement that a two part can accomplish exactly what Balling does?

That was certainly not what I and others got from your post, but assuming it is true, how do we know that Balling does what it claims and no existing two part attains the same? Have you tested them?

For example, C-balance claims:

" C-Balance replenishes calcium and carbonate alkalinity with the correct ratio of both major and minor ions, including magnesium and strontium. Maintaining this balance of ions insures the optimal conditions for growth in stony corals and coralline algae. C-Balance also contains natural seawater concentrations of trace elements"

Maintaining major, minor and trace elements seems the contention. Do you know these do not do as they claim?

 

[srad750c]

A newb question relating to this Dosing ? Do you dose in the DT or the sump? If sumop, which chamber?

I dose in overflow

 

[treedog5]

Very good discussion, I learn something new every day at Reef2Reef..

 

[Lou Ekus]

OK, so we are in agreement that a two part can accomplish exactly what Balling does?

Not exactly what I said. What I said was that I don't know of currently available two part systems that state that they compensate ALL of the 70 trace elements. IMO saying that the product "contains natural seawater concentrations of trace elements" still leaves the possibility that it compensates for some but not necessarily ALL of the trace elements. But that is just semantics and I don't know the specific chemistry of any other company but Tropic Marin. That means that unless it specifically states that it compensates for ALL trace elements found in natural sea water, there is know way for me to know definitively one way or the other. I should have said that "I don't know of any...".

So I will agree with you that a two part system "may" be able to do the same thing. But I did not say that they definitely "can" do exactly the same thing. This thread is getting to the point that we might have to switch it to an English semantics forum .

 

[Randy Holmes-Farley]

I don't disagree with that. That is exactly what I meant.

So to say that a two part "does not" do what your product does is incorrect. They may or "may not" do what yours does, depending on exactly how they are made.

 

[Lou Ekus]

I don't disagree with that. That is exactly what I meant.

So to say that a two part "does not" do what your product does is incorrect. They may or "may not" do what yours does, depending on exactly how they are made.

Wow, we found a middle ground. Pretty good!

It is important to note, though, as I said in my very first post on this. That almost always, when a company says something about the "essential", "important" or "necessary" trace elements, they are almost certainly not talking about all 70. This is a ploy used all the time by manufacturers, and I was trying to shed some light on that.

But I do appreciate that we ended up finding some agreement on this, Randy.

 

[Randy Holmes-Farley]

Wow, we found a middle ground. Pretty good!

It is important to note, though, as I said in my very first post on this. That almost always, when a company says something about the "essential", "important" or "necessary" trace elements, they are almost certainly not talking about all 70. This is a ploy used all the time by manufacturers, and I was trying to shed some light on that.

But I do appreciate that we ended up finding some agreement on this, Randy.

Great.

Just to clarify, do you believe that there are really 70 ""essential", "important" or "necessary" trace elements" ?

Which ones would those be? Most studies cite 30 or less.

 

[Lou Ekus]

Just to clarify, do you believe that there are really 70 ""essential", "important" or "necessary" trace elements" ?

That is not what I was saying either. What I meant as my opinion is this:
1) there are 70 known trace elements in clean natural sea water
2) when listing ingredients in products, many companies use qualifiers like "essential", "important" and "necessary" in relation to the extent of the trace elements that they include.
3) These same companies rarely mean that they include all of the 70 trace elements when they use these terms.
4) These terms are, not always but, mostly used to denote the trace elements that have been identified to have a specific use.
5) We do not know what the importance is of all of the trace elements that have unidentified uses.
6) Some of those unidentified traces may have important functions not yet identified.

I hope this clarifies my stance on this. Just because we don't know what some compound does yet, does not necessarily mean it has no important function.

 

[Randy Holmes-Farley]

OK, that clarifies things, although I'm not really sure where you are getting 70 from then.There are substantially more elements than that in natural seawater.

 

[JimWelsh]

I apologize for not being more specific about company representation. Jim, my wife and I have been the North American office for Tropic Marin for the last 20 years. My statement about not being a chemist is not a "cop out" but a qualifier. I was merely making sure that my comments were taken in context. I will try to get more specific information about the sources and claims of the "70 trace element meme" that you are so critical of, from my scientists in our lab in Germany. My job is to spread the information they supply me with. Hence the "not a chemist" statement. I'll see what I can do in the way of getting that info. For right now, I try to never get in the argument of an absent member. And until I know more, I wouldn't want to make any speculative statements.

I apologize for not knowing who you are. Nice to meet you!

I eagerly await clarification from Germany.

 

[Uncle Bob]

ESV B-Ionic for Alk, Ca. Very easy to use and adjust. That said, considering BRS in the future to save a little money.

 

[marke]

Here is a different perspective. Just ME opinion. I feel we get an abundance of trace elements, trace metals, and other impurities from our fish food, our salt, and out 2 part, including those that misrepresent that these toxic trace metals are good for your corals! That's just BS! We need to reduce the amount of trace in our system due to this excess. We do not want to add more!!! Either independently or as part of a 2.4 part system. The reason for the impurities or trace as some say, is that things added to salt like Ca Kh Mg K etc are all added as Industrial grade and not USP or pharmaceutical grade. This is due to cost. Your salt mix might be to expensive if USP additives or ingredients are used. Same for 2 part. They use Industrial grade raw material that are full of toxic trace elements. These toxic metals get attached to your algae, rock, and bacteria in your tank, and can be released at a future time, like when you get a ph drop. Old tank syndrome is what Ron Slimak calls it. These elements are in NSW; however most of us have them 10-100 times higher than NSW in our systems due to salt and 2 part as well as the food we add. Look at all the Triton results being posted? Remembering that their detection limits are significantly higher than NSW levels. Randy has written about this. Remember only USP is allowed for human or even pet consumption. Industrial is not due to its impurities or unknowns!!! These impurities are acceptable as road melt, and pool additives, and gardening, but not my tank! What makes you think your corals are different than your pet's needs for quality? Ask any 2 part manufacturer to show you a COA certificate of analysis of their product. Here you will see the list of impurities. Only a few companies will show you this, others will tell you the junk in the 2 part is good for you? They maybe even add extra junk but don't exactly disclose what it is? So at the end of the day=====go for the pure stuff!
Question for Tropic Marin? Do you use USP raw ingredients in your 2 or 3 part?

PS: This add was brought to you by the Best------MECORAL

 

[Lou Ekus]

@Randy Holmes-Farley, @JimWelsh

If you look at the PTE in the Ocean of the Monterey Bay Aquarium Research Institute
http://www.mbari.org/science/upper-...roup/periodic-table-of-elements-in-the-ocean/
http://www.mbari.org/science/upper-...roup/periodic-table-of-elements-in-the-ocean/

There are 94 Elements. Some artificial elements are already left off the list like rutherfordium (Rf) and others. The last one of the elements numbered is plutonium (Pu). For Pu no concentration is given, the same for neptunium (Np). Uranium (U) we do not add to the mix. Actinium (Ac) is also radioactive and found in minuscule concentrations in the ocean. We do not add it. The same with radium (Ra) radon (Rn) and polonium (Po). Francium (Fr) and Astatine (At) are not found in the ocean and are also radioactive. Promethium (Pm) is an artificial element that does not exist in nature. 94 less 10 is 84. Then there are the noble gasses that do not form any salts. Radon we already mentioned, helium (He), neon (Ne), argon (Ar), crypton (Kr) and xenon (Xe) left. They are only available as gasses so we can´t add them to the salts. 84 less 5 are 79.

We are talking about the minor and trace elements only, so let's subtract the ones we call major like sodium, potassium, magnesium, calcium, chlorine, sulfur, hydrogen, oxygen and carbon. That 79 minus these 9 resulting in the 70 number I customarily use for the number of trace elements in clean natural sea water, if we leave off the radioactive elements, the noble gasses and artificial elements.

We could certainly argue for a couple of elements being added or subtracted from this list. But I use the 70 number as it makes the most sense to me and, in my opinion, most representative of the actual chemistry as we currently know it. Once again, I hope this clarifies my statements on this.

 

[Lou Ekus]

Question for Tropic Marin? Do you use USP raw ingredients in your 2 or 3 part?

Are products are made with pharmaceutical grade raw materials. But not necessarily US pharmaceutical grade because our products are all produced in Germany. But in many cases the European pharmaceutical requirements are even more stringent than US.

 

[marke]

Lou
Thanks for the quick reply. Good to see you value the importance of starting with high quality raw material. ME also buys its material from around the world. I have never seen a different terminology other than : Reagent,USP, Tech (which is misleading), and the rest which is Industrial grade. Can you share the German terminology for grading not used throughout the rest of the world? Can you also answer why this grading or quality level is not stated on your label? At ME if we pay extra for better quality so we want our users to know that? Also if you add other things to your products, do you feel you should disclose them on the label?
Thanks
ME

 

[Randy Holmes-Farley]

There are multiple pharma grades and other grades around the world, such as BP, British Pharmacopoeia.