Dosing kalk

[BPreefer]

Just want to know how you all dose kalk. I have been dosing via top off water using a aqualifter,but it has become very unreliable. Constant cleaning of lifter and tubing and still doesn't want to pull it from my container. Worked great for just water. Looking for some new ideas , was thinking about getting a dosing pump but a little out of reach right now with changing lights and Xmas on its way. Also if you are using a doser ,does it work well or constant cleaning to work.
Thanks,
Brent

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[Walter White]

I will be testing out an elos osmocontroller with a kalk reservoir over the next couple weeks. Ill let you know how it works. Slick unit but cost is around $200 so depending on what kind of dosing pump you are looking at this may be even more expensive.

 

[miwoodar]

I just quit kalk and went exclusively to RHF's DIY three part solution. I already had a pair of unused Drews Dosers. The annual math....$9 in Driveway Heat + $9 in baking soda (assuming 12 lb bags from Costco) beats $27 of Mrs Wages. The kalk was barely keeping up anyways so I would have had to have started dosing additional Ca/alk regardless. I no longer have to worry about the kalk clogging my top off system either (float valve, gravity feed).

 

[Wicked Color]

I mix it into fresh water and dump it in, corals love it, gotta be carefull the first few times till you know what your system can take, but I dump like 3+ gallons of milk into the tank every couple days. (100 gallon system)

 

[SAZAMA]

I dose all BRS stuff,alk all night to keep the ph stable. but you need a dosing pump and a controller

 

[miwoodar]

WD, out of curiosity, how big of pH spike do you see from 3 gallons of kalk being dumped into 100 gallons of system?

 

[Wicked Color]

dunno, but my corals seem to like it, so.....I will check and see next time, its probably like .1-.2, and to clarify I put 2 heaping teaspoons into a 5 gallon containr, shake it, and dump 2-3 of the 5 in, so---= 1+ teaspoon dose diluted, all at once, every couple days.

 

[BPreefer]

I was dosing Brs then moved to rhf but seemed like such a chore to dose daily. sounds like I may have to get dosing pumps either way just to make it less hands on

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[Wicked Color]

mine is just through top off, sometimes I skip it.

 

[BPreefer]

dunno, but my corals seem to like it, so.....I will check and see next time, its probably like .1-.2, and to clarify I put 2 heaping teaspoons into a 5 gallon containr, shake it, and dump 2-3 of the 5 in, so---= 1+ teaspoon dose diluted, all at once, every couple days.

How much kalk per gallon do you use?

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[BPreefer]

How much kalk per gallon do you use?

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Sorry I guess I don't read so well.lol

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[Wicked Color]

1/3-1/2 tsp per gallon

 

[BPreefer]

I was dosing 2 teaspoons per gallon

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[miwoodar]

I hate doing ANY sort of daily chores to my tank. In spite of my best intentions, I always end up forgetting. It's taken me less than a week to dial in my dosing pumps (280 ml/day into 140 gallons for recipe B). I thought it would take a lot of trial and error. This is almost exactly the same dose as 2 gallons of saturated kalkwasser/day. 2.5 gallons of mix will last 35 days. Recipe A, which is mixed twice as strong, would last 70 days. I might switch to that once I'm comfortable with B.

I remember the first time I ran kalkwasser. I ran 5 gallons of full strength kalk into my ~80 gallon system through a 1/4" line and shot the pH to 9+. It was not a pleasing event and I was too chicken to try kalkwasser again for a looong time. Running kalk is great but it's not going to keep up with a high demand SPS system. You'll inevitably, eventually, need to add Ca/alk through some other means as well though so, as mentioned above, I cut it out of my equation completely. Simple is good for my half-witted brain.

 

[Wicked Color]

were you letting it settle? I just dump it all in, now, no waste, no settling, no drip, now, all of it, in. ->impatient

 

[miwoodar]

I was dosing 2 teaspoons per gallon

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I was running it at saturation too.

 

[BPreefer]

It's a slow drip with top off if I could just get the pump to work

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[BPreefer]

I'm still having to dose Alk to keep up after every 5 gallons. Maybe time for a new system

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[Walter White]

I have noticed that dosing 1/8 teaspoon per gal for all top off is not even keeping up with the demand of my 28 nan cube and i only have a couple small sps. Im going to bump to 1/4 tsp per gal and see what that does. I gotta say though even with just 1/8 tsp per gal I have noticed a nice rise in ph.

 

[miwoodar]

If you PM me your e-mail, I'll send you a calculator in Excel based on Randy's systems. Even if you don't use them, you'll have something in case you ever consider it later.