Corals don't look right.

I am not familture with that test kit but on my sea hem test kit for copper it reads up to 8ppm. And it says to dilute it 1:1 with plain water then multiply the results by 2. That will give you an idea of what the calcium is even though your kit only reads up to 500. You understand what i mean?

 

What are you using to measure salinity? With numbers that high for both Ca and Alk I would suspect that the salinity mat be too high.

 

Hydrometer

 

Your going to want to invest in a refractometer. I used a hydrometer for a month or so then bought a refractometer. My hydrometer was reading 1.022 and I tested the same water with my refractometer and it was at 1.026. Pretty big difference if you ask me. Try running the test again but dilute the sample with plain rodi water 1:1 then multiply then results by 2. So if your kit reads to 500. Let's say you Ru. The test with it diluted and it reads 300 you'll then multiply it by two and get 600. That's how you can get results that are out of the range that your test will read.

 

Bottom pic looks better because it's clear but the zoas really look about the same to me. If they are opening up I would say they're fairly happy. Every coral looks different under different lights. If you're doing a properly mixed water change that often I would say things are good. I love the red sea coral pro salt BTW.
+1 on getting a refractometer. You may be able to get away with no test kits in a tank that small with regular water changes but you at least need to know your salt mix is accurate.

 

Yeah I think my next purchase will be a refractometer.

 

It takes 5ml of tank water to do the test. Are you saying use 2.5 of tank water and 2.5 of RODI water ?

 

How many ml of tank water are you using for each test? (Mag, calc and alk)?

 

5 and 5

 

I guess I'm simple. Lol. So I use 5 ml of tank water and 5 ml of RO water. 10 ml in all right ?