dosing confusion

Hey guys,
I have been dosing pretty regularly and honestly I haven't seen any consistencies. Everytime I do a water change I just add how much ever Ca or Alk I need to get it back up to normal...now I obviously see a change in the overall look of my corals towards the end of w/c period. I've looked at all the numbers people say that you should be dosing this much a day or that much a day...and I've come up with 14.5mL a day. Now that doesn't seem like much. And I know people say "dose and then test...if its not enough then increase dosing" But how much is too much for dosing? What if I don't see any change? Because ever since I've started dosing I really haven't seen a change in numbers...any ideas?

 

O.k. you have to be more specific. What are you dosing? Are you just dosing for Calc and alk after a water change? Then you say you have come up with 14.5 ml a day but don't say of what. 14.5 ml of what?

Let's start over. I take it you know the ranges but let's go over them.
Calc = 380-500 ppm.......Alk = 8-12 dkh.......Mag = 1080-1410 pm.......
Ph = 8.1-8.4 So, test (on whatever day you want) and see what needs to be adjusted. If raising something, do it slow over a few days. Once you get the parameters where you want them (within the range) wait 2-3 days and test again to discover the fall off rate of each particular parameter. if no change or minimal change after 3 days, wait for another 3 days (this puts you at the 1 week mark) and test again. The tank should be consuming some of the elements and those that are starting to fall to the lower end of the range will need to be adjusted.
Now, every tank is different. I know some who rarely have to raise their Alk while I add 2 teaspoons of Reef Builder every other day in my top off water to maintain 10 dkh. If I don't after 5-7 days my alk will be 7 dkh.
I hope this helps but if still unsure ask more questions.

 

I don't do water changes... I don't think I could keep my ca,alk,mg stable if i did!

i have an auto doser that doses those three. alk and ca are daily.

First thing I did was get my Mg up to par manually.

Then, i measured out how much it (my auto dose pump) doses in X seconds and set it up to dose something like 5ml (I don't remember) a day of each.

Then I waited a week and tested. One was slightly high the other slightly low. So I went back to my timers and adjusted them and tested in another week.

ANyway, it took a month or two to get it dialed in correctly, but now my params are always

440 Ca
13 Alk
1470 Mg

Always. I love it.


Throw in a WC and it's like hitting the reset button IMO. Each batch of fresh made WCW seems to have a different reading and, frankly, it's a lot of work to get my WCW water up to levels of the DT. And if you don't, then you have to dose up the DT to get back on target which throws off the daily times... so, IMO, WC is not worth it (I also have 0 nitrates and phosphates and good coral growth, so I can get away w/the no WC).


But that's how I do it.

 

so the point is, you dose enough so that you're not raising or lowering the value. i.e. you see no change in readings.

you're only making up what the corals have used up.


from your note, are you adding Mg to your WCW? If not, you're going to be lowering that number and then the other two become more difficult. All three need to be brought to target in the WCW.

 

In reply to both you...

Unclejed: I dose bulk reef supplies "two part" kit...it consists of calcium chloride, sodium bicarbonate and a mixture of magnesium chloride and magnesium sulfide. Although I do dose epsom salts (MgSO4) when the supplied mixture runs out (which runs out fast). I understand the whole dose and check and dial in a fixed amount...but my problem is it never stays consistent.

Peredhil: What kind of dosing pump do you use? The ones I've looked at are a pretty expensive. It would be pretty nice to have it all automated...it is a possibility. Even though you don't do WC...does your Mg stay consistent? Because since I try to do a water change every month or so I guess I really am "hitting the restart button".

I really see no point in a water change...expcept for trace elements. I did try going without them for a while but I kinda felt guilty. I don't know why! I guess I'll have to fiddle with it more and find that sweet spot.

 

Hi ermano

Here's a pic of it (top left)




It was about 400 bucks. They come in single, double, triple, and quad pumps. Mine is the triple. I recommend a double... that's about 300 bucks.

My Mg is stable. I have to dose about 20oz (of the BRS Mg solution that we both use) every other month or so. I have it timed out that I need to run the pump for 10 minutes to raise my Mg 100 points. So when it drops to about 1370-1400 I run the pump for ten minutes and then I'm back to 1500. I actually just did this last week.


Here is the thread I had when I was setting this up

http://www.3reef.com/forums/filters-pumps-etc/dosing-pump-question-66742.html


And here's a fun video of how my setup is automated and I don't have to do much with it anymore ;D

I have the good fortune of being able to mount all this stuff behind the tank under the stairs... but none of it is particularly large (other than the ATO reservoir)

 

So what test kits do you use? Are they good?

What kind of usage do you have? Lots of sps, some lps, softies?

When I went to BRS 2 part, I could not get it right. Numbers kept going down, I kept dosing more.... until I got to a ridiculous amount and calcified my pumps.

Putting in too much can of something can drive the others down. Are you calcifying anything? Next, my kits were bad. Was using Seachem, but went to Salifert and the numbers were off. BRS told me to stop dosing for 3 days. Once I got a good test, then I let the tank settle and started again with much lower amounts.

What is your Mg at?

If you are at 14ml, that is 45ml for me. Not too crazy, but I have been using more cause my clam and montis are growing well. So I have been trying to account for the new growth.

I can keep mine pretty consistent though. WC do not bother me. Not that much, but I wanted to do less. 20% a month?

 

I believe a WC should not hurt if you change out no more then 10% every other week. I do it that way and don't see any fluctuations in parameters..

When you are trying to set up a consistant dosing regimen, you are going to have to test often, like every 3-4 days.. And record all your parameters on paper. How much you dosed and how your parameters were effected. I recently did this when I started using Kalk to make sure it was going to be slowing increasing or decreasing my cal and alk. I don't dose mag that much so I test the water then add mag if need be.

One thing that helped me out while using supplements is figuring out how much of whatever supplement it takes to increase the levels.. For instance, 5g of seachem calcium powder in a 40g raises calcium 12mg/L. If your calcium is 408mg/L in your 40g and you want to raise it to 420mg/L, then you need to add 5g.

Also take into consideration the depletion amount.

 

Unclejed: It's called the two part kit by bulk reef supply...whilst it may actually have 3 things in it, that's what the website calls it. That's the products name. I really don't see what that would have to do with anything anyways. I've never mixed my supplements together.

Peredhil: I like your set up. I'll have to look into those dosing pumps more in depth.

Everyone else: I have a bit of everything...LPS, SPS and softies. My tests kits are as follows: Ca-elos, Mg-salifert and Alk-API. I have cross-checked them with my LFS and I'm pretty sure they're close to accurate. +/- a few ppm's.

Currently my Mg is at 1150. I'm working on getting up right now but I know eventually it will fall back down. And in turn mess up my Ca and Alk. My Ca is at 340 and my Alk is at 10.5 dKH. I guess we'll just have to see what happens...I think I'm going to go back to no water changes because I think that is what's causing my levels to get all wishy washy. Thanks for the ideas everyone!!