Kalk Setup for a small tank

[HKAVR45]

I have been reading up on dosing kalk to take care of my low Ca and Alk levels as well as algae in my 15g. I would like some comments on the setup and the frequency of dripping kalk.

The plan is as follows:

I will mix a week's worth of Kalk, which will be 1 gallon (128 Oz.). The solution is then immediately poured into (7) 16.9 Oz. Poland Sring bottles and each are capped. The solution will sit for at least 24 hrs. Each night when the lights are off I will begin dripping the kalk solution. I haven't fully timed how quickly ~>16 Oz. is released, but I will say its on the order of about 7-8 hours. Every night a new bottle is attached to the dripper making sure not to unsettle the milky solution on the bottom of the container.
For the first two weeks I plan on testing the water each night prior to adding the kalk, after the two weeks I think I will be able to tell if dripping every night is necessary or not.

So after reading and reading I'm still a little confused with the question below.

1. Is ~16 Oz. too much per night or will I find out through testing? My topoff could certainly take 16Oz. each night.

Also, any suggestions are very very welcome.

Thanks.

 

[extremest]

its trial and error until you find out the amount of topoff required. i drip all of my topoff with kalk water.

 

[Aquadiva]

Any idea where your PH is at....

The kalk is going to raise your PH...If it runs high to begin with, you might overwhelm a 15 gallon tank with 16 ozs even over 7-8 hours. What's in the tank?? SPS??LPS??

Testing is going to tell you eventually how much you need to drip. I would maybe drip 8 or even 4 ozs the first time and see how the PH is affected.

JMO...YMMV

 

[HKAVR45]

My current pH is ~ 7.9-8.0.

Livestock =

Kenya Tree
Green Tree
GSP
Yellow Polyps
Button Polyps
Pink Zoas
Green Zoas

Percula
Yellow Goby

The algae is my main concern. Its starting to grow on the zoas preventing them from opening. It had been suggested to me before to try dripping kalk, which would end the algae issues.

 

[Aquadiva]

You certainly have room for your PH to move up. You just don't want it to rise a lot all at once.

What is your CA and ALK, now. The idea of dripping kalk to get rid of the hair algea is to allow your skimmer to help get the phosphates out. Any idea what your phosphates are at? Could be your problem as well.

 

[ScooterNH]

Kalk drip

At first I thought your 7-bottle approach was a bit over the top, but it's actually a rather nice idea for a small tank. I also have a 15g that I drip kalk into. I mix up 1/2 gallon and set up a siphon with an air valve/stop. The problem is that while I initially set the valve to drip about 1 per sec. Sometimes I when I check the next morning it's either running fine (though usually slower), completely drained, or completely stopped. Never really seems to run consistantly. I clean the tuning and container prior to each use, but it still isn't all that consistant. I go through a bottle or two each week but it's pretty inconsistant. And I don't want nasty fluctuations in ca and alk.

Your approach at least is a nice limiting guard against the whole supply getting dumped at once. Think I may adopt your method.

A modification that just came to mind is to make some sort of gravity drip rig (rather than a siphon) . The feed end could be a bottles cap with solid tubing sticking up about an inch or two (to avoid the sediment), a valve at the bottom for control. Your bottles of "todays supply" could have a puncturable membrane (celophane). Store them inverted. Then you just screw the source bottle into the cap&tube and it starts draining. I might play around with that idea.

 

[HKAVR45]

Linda,

Ca = 385
Alk = ~2.5-3
Phos = undetectable (But I think its because the algae is constantly using them up)
Nitrates were about 20

Scooter,

My main concern was actually overflow. I didn't want a 2.5 gallon Kent Aquadoser dumping into my tank. The setup works pretty well with the siphon, but I do find myself fiddling with it every once in a while to get the drips going again. I will tell you, after I found the "sweet spot" that valve dripped at a nice rate from 5:30PM until about 10:30PM and there was still about a third of the solution to drip.

Maybe I'll start off as Linda suggested. Instead of 16Oz, I will go with 8Oz and see where I am after a week.

 

[Aquadiva]

Your CA is a little low
Your Alk is a little low....I would assume that is in meq/l and not dKh. If it's the latter, it's VERY low...

Nitrates are high...I would be worried about those.. got a refugium? or a little something to sop up those nitrates...otherwise, water changes would be good.

Just go slow...you don't want the ph to rise too fast.

 

[HKAVR45]

Thanks for your help Linda. I am running an Aqua Clear 500 instead of the filter media I have live rock and some Chaeto in the chamber.

Water changes occur every weekend. I have one of those Aquarium Pharmacuticals DI units, but IMO it stinks. RODI unit is the next purchase. In the meantime I'm going to buy distilled water from the store for changes/topoffs.

 

[NateHanson]

I think you'll be fine with that for starters. Just test Ca and Alk every day for a while to see what it's doing. You may need to add more, or drip 24 hours to keep your Ca and Alk up.

Additionally, I'd recommend adding some CaCl2 and washing soda to gradually bring your levels closer to 425 and 3.5 or 4.0. If you do that in the first few days of Kalk drip, and then monitor very closely for the next week with kalk alone, you'll be able to get an idea of how to change your ongoing kalk regime.

Nate

 

[HKAVR45]

Nate,

Washing Soda = Baking Soda? NOT POWDER...

Can this be added by mixing with RODI water and dumping into the tank? Should it be dripped? Can it be mixed with the Kalk and dripped in together?

Thanks. This has been a HUGE help for me.

 

[ScooterNH]

Overflow

My main concern was actually overflow. I didn't want a 2.5 gallon Kent Aquadoser dumping into my tank. The setup works pretty well with the siphon, but I do find myself fiddling with it every once in a while to get the drips going again. I will tell you, after I found the "sweet spot" that valve dripped at a nice rate from 5:30PM until about 10:30PM and there was still about a third of the solution to drip.

Oh, that's exactly what I meant. One night my siphon drip decided to start flowing more and dumped everything overnight. (ie 1/2 gal of kalc into my 15g tank overnight) Ikes! Can't be good. Rare, but it's happened, and a possible risk still. Usually my flow just stops for some reason. Clogging the stopvalve or something.

But in any event, your small dose bottle idea is kinda cool in that you limit the risk to a single days dose.