Why does reef crystals only have 320 Ca?
 

I have come to acknowledge the fact that reef crystals only mix up to have around 300-320 Ca at my household. I bought 2 buckets 1 year a part and same thing happens, maybe some Ca precipatated but I am not the only one finding Ca levels low this with this salt when I do a search.

It's a good salt for me from a price stand point and I have good luck raising the calcium to 375-400 with reef complete. I need a cheaper way to supplement the calcium in the freshly mixed water so should I use turbo calcium?

Either you are not making it up to NSW salinity (sg = 1.0264) or you are measuring calcium incorrectly or it has precipitated as calcium carbonate or you just got a bad batch.

Could be any of those. It is normally much higher.

I make my RODI water and then turn on power head and heater and dump all the amount of salt requred in. As much as required to 1.026. Is this the wrong way to do it.

The kits should be close.. I use seachem, reference solution works, I used another kit on the reef crystals before and it will confirm silimar results within 25 ppm. Althought the color changing sucks and is easy to miss but would have been easiler to mistaken read high than low..
The Red Sea Coral Pro salt have alot more calcium as shown by the test kit.

I measured the PH of my RODI water with a pinpoint meter and it is around 8.

[url]http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&q=reef+crystals+low+calcium[/url]

How are you measuring the sg?

refractometer recently verified with another reefer's more expensive version to be reading the same.

OK, so you can probably rule out a couple of the options, leaving precipitation in the bucket, or an off batch (or a bad test kit).

is precipitation visible in the bucket? Does it show in the water column or just white resident. I am using the grey brute trash can.

Out of the other possibilities I thought reef crystals is the most suspect.. But like I said when I add the calcium to 400 then all is well..

Let's say my test kit is correct I have 80 gallons of water in the aquarium that reads 325ppm. What is a good way to raise it?

White stuff at the bottom, which is not unusual, but it would be unusual for it to drop calcium too much unless they put too much alkalinity into the bucket (which has happened to some brands, including IO).

If calcium is low and alkalinity is OK, I'd boost it with calcium chloride. I do that to every batch of IO. I also boost magnesium in every batch of IO.

Me and a few of my friends have all gotten the same results. Easy to fix, but disappointing.

I just got a new Elos Ca kit. I'm going to test it again now. I just made a new batch last night.

I just got 300 ppm. Salinity 35 ppt via refractometer. I mixed up about 25 gallons or so last night to refill my 32 gallon reservoir. I use a seio 2600 for circulation, so it gets mixed into solution really fast and I don't get any precipitation on the bottom of the container.

Hi Mike how do you like the ELOS test kit, is there a sharp change in color?

A few teaspoons of calcium chloride shouldn't be a bad fix, since the alk is already quite high..

I don't trust each bucket so it's a good idea to check the calcium on each new bucket..

It's similar to salifert in the way you perform the test. But you have to count the drops. Also each drop is 25 ppm. If you want to get more precise, they have a seperate reagent you can buy that each drop is 5 ppm. There is a sharp color change.

It's not my favorite, but as long as it's close to accurate, I guess I'm happy with it. It was kind of expensive though.

Very Odd. I've been through MANY buckets of RC and it always mixes up to ~ 420 @ 1.026

I think you have a bad test kit.....

[QUOTE][i]<a href=showthread.php?s=&postid=11369869#post11369869 target=_blank>Originally posted</a> by Randy Holmes-Farley [/i]
[B]White stuff at the bottom, which is not unusual, but it would be unusual for it to drop calcium too much unless they put too much alkalinity into the bucket (which has happened to some brands, including IO).

If calcium is low and alkalinity is OK, I'd boost it with calcium chloride. I do that to every batch of IO. I also boost magnesium in every batch of IO. [/B][/QUOTE]

Is that Randy "dropping by" or staying a while?

Dropping by when I can, not when I can't. More flexible this way. :)

awesome!

Honestly I switched recently to RC, and too was dissappointed. Same readings as IO, and as te OP. But, after careful reading, RC doesn't actually claim to have higher Ca....

I've used RC and IO. They dont have the same Ca IME. @ 1.026 IO = 360, RC =420.

420? :eek2:

Well, I'm making some up tonight, so I'll test, again....

I bought from Dr F&S where did you folks buy it?

Same low reading here. Mg is low too. I mix 30g at a time to 1.026.

2 buckets from DFS.

Did a group buy of 11 buckets from DFS.

i consistently seem to get ~360ppm ca with reef crystals. alk is always on the high end at 14dKH +. I've started dosing my fresh mixed sw with calcium.

i wonder if its how i'm mixing it. i generally fill a 5g bucket with rodi water, then add the salt all at once, then mix with a large spatula, then add a powerhead and let age for at least a day.

i wonder if i mixed while adding the salt, if less ca would precipitate (if thats even the cause of my low rc ca readings)

Ok, I complained about this a year ago, I thought I have a bad bucket, now 2 buckets bought 1 year apart shouldn't be the same batch of it... and thanks for confirming those of you with low readings..

I want to know the folks with 400+ Ca where they bought theirs from... or how are you mixing your water