Kalkwasser

[albee1]

I have read that all makeup water should be done with kalkwasser (if you use it). My system is 350 gallon combined and with an evaporation rate of approx 3 gallons a day how does one make up that much water with Kalk ? I dose both nutrients and kalk thru a spectrapure litermeter III.

Thanks for any help

[nepuck]

I use makeup water w/ pickling lime added (2tsp./gal). I mix it in 20 gal. batches. It works great so far. Go to the Reef Chemistry forum. There are good articles and links.

[RedEyeReef]

Get Kalk reactor with RO DI fresh water reservoir and float switch. It is the only way to go.

http://www.barraquatic.com/

[albee1]

can I feed that much water thru the kalk reactor daily without overdosing my system ? I currently use a spectrapure litermeter III and a Kent Maxima RO/DI. I use a precision marine calcium reactor and dose my kalk thru the litermeter but still have to add makeup water every day.

[RedEyeReef]

I am not an expert, but I don't see why not. Just keep up on you Ca and Alk tests, if they get too high, back down your Kalk input or your Reactor out put. If you get a big enough Kalk Reactor, the Reactor won't have a problem with keeping up with the top off. My Barr Aquatic Kalk Reactor is 8" diameter and 25" high for my 360 gallon SPS reef. I set the stir bar for 4 times a day, 3 minutes each time. Just set the stir speed and time so the Kalk storm gets with in about 6� of top of Kalk Reactor so no undisolved pieces enter your tank. Pretty easy setup. Check out Barr Aquatic web page. With the Reactor, you no longer have to mix Kalk every day, it does it for you.

[albee1]

Thanks for your reply. do you have an opinion on precision marine Kalk reactor ? I have a Precision Marine XL-2 skimmer and a CR622 calcium Reactor and think the reactor might be a good choice to help get the calcium up.

[nysbadmk8]

beware, do not dose All you top off water at one time, you will cause a Large ph spike. Kalwasser solution has a ph of 12-12.5, dumping 3 gallons in at once will move your ph up, and might move it too much depending on you tank size. i would suggest 1/2 gallon dose's or 1 gallon dose's at diffrent points of the day, or a continueus drip ( what i do ). Ask dr. ron what the safe amount of a full strenght kalk solution you can put into your tank at one time.

[mhurley]

I dose 4 1/2 gallons of kalk make up water per day into my 330 (about 450 of system water). No ill effects. It's just dosed 24/7 with a dosing pump.

I use a MyReef kalk reactor...love it.

Mike

[dgasmd]

I evaporate 10-12 gpd. I replace all of it over a 42 hour period with kalk via a Ca reactor. I also have a jumbo size Ca reactor in addition to that. Despite using that much kalk, it does not have as much of an effect on the pH of the tank as you would think. Positive or negative. I have run out of kalk for weeks at times and the pH does not change one bit because of it. Kalk does have some other benefits to it, so I continue to use it for those, but not really for the alk and Ca supplementation. To me, that is jsut a plus.

[nysbadmk8]

right, thats continueus dosing, i was warning him of dumping all 3 gallons of kalk at once.

[albee1]

Thank you all for your help ...
I have decided to purchace the Precision Marine Kalk reactor and dose my 3.5 gallons of make up water per day thru it. "I am somewhat a fan of the Precision Marine products as you can see in my gallery" I have dosed all of my make up water with Kalk for the last few days and have seen no major jumps in PH and AlK is still hanging at 12.5 .