3 part dosing on biocube 29g HQI

I am planning to start 3 part dosing on my 29g biocube, which i will be stocking heavily with sps. If somebody is doing 3 part on their biocube, please let me know how much are you dosing and at what rate and your dosing pump timer setting. I will be doing mag, cal and alk tests myself to adjust the dosages. Any initial help or tips will be great help. Thanks.

 

Just test it, and dose based on that. I wouldn't go ahead and tell you any amount of time to dose; you need to figure that out yourself, as your system is going to have different needs - not only because it's different than mine in what's there, but your growth rate will be different, and thus your consumption will be different.

 

Thanks, i totaly agree with you but when you started the whole dosing system when did you and how often did you do the tests for all three to evaluate the dosing rate?

 

reloadeddevil

I tested weekly and for about 12 months as my tank was developing, water changes alone seemed to maintain parameters

as the number of corals/ frags and coraline started to increase
I noted a steady drop on both calcium and DKH/Alkalinity

Magnesium to this day seems to only drop 10 - 20ppm a month in my tank

suggest you

if you are doing weekly water changes
measure your parameters 24 hours after next water change
and the measure them again, before you do your subsequent water change
that will show you your weekly demand

its also a good idea to test the parameters calc, alk and Mag in the new salt water
and provided you are using a good quality salt mix, if you then work on maintaining the parameters the salt mix gives you, it saves you the bother of supplementing the new mix prior to water change

example
if your salt mix , gives you 450 calcium, 9 dkh and 1440 Mag
then working towards maintaining those numbers is simple and convienient
and it means less chance of parameter fluctuations at water change time


Steve

 

Steve has provided sound advice as always - especially with respect to the salt mix testing. He makes an excellent point about the ease of maintaining the parameters based on the parameters of the freshly mixed saltwater - if you aim to keep those parameters - you know at least your water change water is going to be exactly what your system needs.

 

Thank you Steve, Blackraven and Ocean so much for your much needed input on the matter. Will do and see if system needs any further dosing.

 

Go slow and let it grow!

 

Ok i just checked my ca and mg they are as follow:

Ca: 450
Mg: 1280
Alk: 9

Please let me know if they seem kind of okay.

 

Those seem like pretty solid numbers.

 

I agree with Clarkkey, that they are solid numbers
all within acceptable parameters

if you find that in future dosing Ca tends to lower your DKH or vice versa
then increasing your Mag to around 1350 - 1400 can help stabilise the other 2 ions in solution

Steve