Calcium level very high over 600 ppm

[steve214989]

My calcium is very high. Heard it wasnt bad but wanted your opinions. All my other water params are perfect. I hate to admit it but I cannot at the moment afford an RODI unit and have been using tap water. System is a 75g rr 2x250MH 10ks, 55g sump/refugium, ETSS 500 skimmer, mag 9.5 on skimmer and another on return. Have approx 50#s of well seasoned live rock, and 2 modded maxi 1200s for flow. Havent seen any problems from the high calcium yet except that green algae on glass seems to be growing faster. Thanks for the thoughts in advance.

 

[GottisEgo]

I hate to admit it but I cannot at the moment afford an RODI unit and have been using tap water.

I dont have a solution for your calcium problem but I had purchased this RODI for $130. It's a fantastic unit and alot of the BRS members here use it also. Under $150 and does everything, probably better than those $400 unit you see.

http://www.watergeneral.com/product01.aspx

 

[Behrmon]

I've seen worse 1st hand (800 :eek). Do you have access to an LFA to but some RO water, you might be better served with fewer changes with better water.

 

[mb75]

I hate to admit it but I cannot at the moment afford an RODI unit and have been using tap water.

I was using tap water myself, until I found that Skipton's in Dorchester sells RO/DI for .50 a gallon.

The calcium could be from the tap water. The Braintree town website should have a water report available, check that out and see what they claim the levels are. Test your tap water as well if the report is a bit old.

If you are dosing liquid calcium, give it a rest a bit. I had a problem with high calcium, and after cutting my dosing, and two 20% water changes, it dropped to more acceptable levels.

 

[jbishop]

I am pretty sure walmart sells RODI thats even been through a uv sterilizer for .25 a gallon.

 

[Joel A]

I am pretty sure walmart sells RODI thats even been through a uv sterilizer for .25 a gallon.

some do, some don't. They actually don't sell it as RO water though, they sell it as "purified drinking water" or some crap like that. It is RO water, but personally i'd trust a LFS a bit more then walmart... especially because at the very least i imagine a good LFS would be conscious about changing their filters out every now and then (can't imagine walmart would pay that close of attention)

if you don't have anything else though, the walmart idea might be worth a try.

 

[Matt L.]

Are you sure the test is accurate? Adding alkalinity should start precipitating that out and bringing it back down. There are many things in tap water that would interfere with the calcium test and cause a false positive. Definitely check out Skiptons or WalMart.

Matt