Better than average Reef Crystals deal

ShawnM

Amphipod
M.A.S.C Club Member
#1
This probably only helps the folks who buy a lot of salt, but may save you a few bucks plus they bring it to your house.

Petco has a buy 2 and get 30% of buckets or boxes of Reef Crystals. You will need to have it shipped as they only carry buckets in the stores. I can’t find any store with two buckets right now.

The price is $42.45 for the box or $39.99 for a bucket. You will need to order 2 and they will charge $5.99 for shipping.

The math works out to around $33 to $35 a box delivered.

I ordered 4 boxes on Saturday and my total charge was $135.00 with tax. Plus with Petco they give you a $5 credit every time you spent about $160.

I can confirm this works. I can see the 4 boxes moving in the UPS system today. Hopefully they don’t trash any of the boxes.
 

jda123

Dolphin
M.A.S.C Club Member
#2
Going to look and see if this works of IO. The last time that I ordered some IO, they sent me RC and when I called them they seemed all excited that I could keep the RC. It is not a huge deal except I had to rework the muriatic acid and dowflake that I add to my mixture.

Thanks for the heads up.
 

ShawnM

Amphipod
M.A.S.C Club Member
#3
Going to look and see if this works of IO. The last time that I ordered some IO, they sent me RC and when I called them they seemed all excited that I could keep the RC. It is not a huge deal except I had to rework the muriatic acid and dowflake that I add to my mixture.

Thanks for the heads up.
This sale was kind of unusual. I frequently see the IO sales where Petco / Chewy / Amazon discount the buckets. I don’t see the RC buckets very often and never see the RC boxes.
 

ShawnM

Amphipod
M.A.S.C Club Member
#5
Wanted to share this post for laughs

I’ve had a lot of salt shipped to my house in the last 15 years, and I’m always curious to see how it arrives. The picture attached is what the 4 boxes I ordered from Petco looked like. Those are 24” wide boxes for a box of salt that is just over 14” wide.

Even more extreme were 3 buckets of reef crystals I received from Amazon 2 months ago. Each bucket arrived in a box with dimensions of 40” x 22” x 16”

I often wonder how much the UPS and FedEx drivers hate delivering to me.


View attachment 20512
 

jda123

Dolphin
M.A.S.C Club Member
#6
They are capping the savings at $50 right now. ...still get 4 boxes for $34 each.

I always joke that people will spend $50 on a ICP test to try and cure an ill, but a 50 gallon sack of salt (IO usually) is $8.50 and can cure many more ills. :)

Thanks for the heads up on this.

I hate that they always ship them in boxes, but at least the PetCo boxes are hardy and can be reused for other things. I would be just as happy if they just shipped them in the regular box since they are so tough.
 

Stithe

Cleaner Shrimp
M.A.S.C Club Member
#7
What is this "IO" that I keep seeing? I probably know somewhere in my mind, but can't place that abbreviation.
 

SynDen

Administrator
Staff member
M.A.S.C Club Member
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#8
What is this "IO" that I keep seeing? I probably know somewhere in my mind, but can't place that abbreviation.
Instant Ocean
 

Stithe

Cleaner Shrimp
M.A.S.C Club Member
#9
Just picked up 15 boxes. Had to do multiple orders in order to get the savings, but hopefully everything comes ok. 15 boxes was about $480 with shipping, so just barely under $32 a box. Pretty damn good deal if you ask me.
 

jda123

Dolphin
M.A.S.C Club Member
#10
Just ran a calculator and it looks like 25mls of Muriatic Acid in a 44g brute with a 50g bag of RC will bring the alk down in the 7s... 20 if you want it closer to 8 dKh. I usually add 20mls of Muriatic and 2 tbsp of dowflake to my IO to both bring the alk down and calcium up, but it does not look like the calcium needs brought up in RC. If anybody tries this let me know how it turns out... and don't forget to wait a day or two for the pH to come back up after putting the acid in.

Gallons * desired dKh drop * .123 is the number of MLs of muriatic to use in your salt mix if you want to customize.
 

ShawnM

Amphipod
M.A.S.C Club Member
#11
Just picked up 15 boxes. Had to do multiple orders in order to get the savings, but hopefully everything comes ok. 15 boxes was about $480 with shipping, so just barely under $32 a box. Pretty damn good deal if you ask me.
I had 10 salt boxes delivered once in an attempt to save money. Kind of back fired. My wife saw the 10 boxes on the porch and decided she was due a shopping spree of her own.
 

jda123

Dolphin
M.A.S.C Club Member
#15
I use a 10ml syringe to get the muriatic out, probably from an old Salifert test kit. I tip the jug to the side until the syringe can get to the liquid. I hold my breath for the few seconds and walk away before I breathe again. The stuff can be nasty, but it is not death in a bottle or anything. Just be smart and careful like you do with other nasty household chemicals. People use gallons of this stuff in swimming pools and don't get hurt. The most important thing is to add the acid to the water.

When I last purchased the stuff, it was at Lowes and I got like 2 gallons for under 10 bucks.
 
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