Brenton's Mr. Aqua 12 gallon long reef build

Thank you

 

Well using kalk so far, my ph has been stable between 7.9 and 8.1, I just can't wait to get an apex controller to be able to monitor it 24/7.

I am still having a little trouble keeping alk up though, it was good at 8-9 for a little while and then it is dropping again, seemingly faster than I am able to replace it. Any ideas as to what might be causing this?

 

Do you have values for Magnesium and Ca?

 

Ca 460
Mag 1360
KH 6.7

Both the Ca and Mag have been fairly stable over the last 2 weeks or so.

 

Hmmm, are you getting a lot of coralline algae growth?

What salt mix are you using?

Does not seem like you have enough corals to see a lot of utilization yet.

If you start out with lower values after a water change you might consider changing salts.

I have two test kits for ALk, because I find Alk tests to the most difficult to get an accurate value on.

 

I'm using kent marine reef salt mix and it the alk seems fine whenever I do a water change. I am making some for tomorrow so I will test it before I do the water change and make any corrections if necessary early.

I am getting the same alk readings from my API (which I never really trust) and my RedSea test kits. I am thinking about getting a Hanna Checker to take the error out of the subtle titration that either test kit uses.

I am not necessarily seeing a large amount of coralline growth although there is some. My sps and lps do seem to be growing fairly quickly, I have a duncan coral colony that gets a new head probably every week and a candy cane coral which is growing at about the same rate, and both those have large skeletons so I am thinking that that may be where I am loosing most of it, although I would think that Ca and Mag would fall at the same rate. As well as kalk I have been dosing RedSea part B Alk which keeps it up, I am just wondering if there were any reasons why one would drop while the others are fairly stable.

 

Alk get used a lot faster in my experience. There is a ratio for it but I have forgotten what it is.

Corals growing is usually your culprit.

Here you go:

http://www.reefkeeping.com/issues/2004-12/rhf/

 

Very informative article and a very interesting read. Thank you for the link and for your help, thats exactly the kind of information I was looking for.

 

You're welcome.

All of Randy Holmes-Farley stuff is excellent, but I need two cups of coffee buzz to wrap my head around a lot of it. Probably re-read it 3 times a year.

 

Just a couple of updates. I received a handful of chaeto from a local reefer last Saturday and placed that in my system and removed the gfo. Since then my alk has for the most part stabilized and the chaeto has probably doubled in size. Seems like gfo may have been causing my alk problems.

Also my green monti cap which had mostly browned out seems to be getting greener every day since the addition of the chaeto. I am still waiting for the green to return to my browned out green birdsnest which is growing very fast but is brown...
I am getting a better phosphate and nitrate test this week to see where those values really stand, I just can't really tell with my API test kit. Other than that everybody is happy with the change and I think I may have eliminated a cost for the time being! More money to save towards a controller!