A little update...
Over the last 2 weeks I bumped up my Mg (to 1400) and started raising the Alk in the tank. Also finally picked up a Ca test so I could watch for consumption rather than just testing 2x a week to make sure my levels were within the normal range. I noticed that once I started dosing Alk, the SPS in the tank showed visible skeletal growth (go figure...). Also, it seemed that my Alk would essentially "bottom out" and not drop lower than that 6.7 mark which prompted me to start dosing in the first place. I'm not really understanding how that works...but nevertheless I was at least able to raise the Alk in the tank and watch it's consumption.
Current parameters
Mg: 1385
Alk: 7.0
Ca: 410
My Mg levels stay pretty stable...they drop 5-10ppm daily. Alk is being consumed at 0.8 dkh per day now that the SPS are actually happy and growing, and Ca is being consumed at 10ppm per day.
Right now I have Seachem products that I've been using to raise the levels (Reef Builder/Advantage Mg/Ca), but have a few questions.
I'd like to get my Alk to about 8.0ppm. Since I've just been mixing the buffer into a portion of my top-off water and adding it to the tank, I've only been adding enough to increase the Alk by 1dkh. Given the rate of consumption, I should in theory hit 8.0dkh at some piont next week if the tank is only consuming about 0.8 per day and I'm adding 1.0. Should I be concerned about the daily spike until I get to that point though? From what I gathered, it's best not to increase by more than 1.0dkh per day...can I mix a stronger solution and slowly drip it into the tank during the day time so that a little is extra is being added while the tank is also consuming it? In other words...mix enough to add about 1.5 or 2.0 dkh, but drip it slowly enough that by the end of the day the overall increase is 1.0 dkh or so and I avoid getting a spike.
At this point, I've basically confirmed that I won't be able to get away with just water changes in my tank. Things were fine til I added the SPS...definitely let myself get sucked in to that one
My original goal was to NOT have a complicated system that I'd have to manually dose daily, but it's definitely come to that. So, what's the next step if I want to dose the tank and avoid the daily grind of manual dosing? I also travel for work on occasion and live alone, so having some automation dialed in would be beneficial.
Right now I'm sitting on a JBJ ATO unit that I planned on just hooking up for RO top offs...but now I'm debating using it for kalk. That being said, I used a kalk calculator and it looks like without the addition of Vinegar to supersaturate the solution, I wouldn't meet the tank's consumption of 0.8dkh per day...I have a closed top on the tank and it evaporates very little water in a day (about 1200ml) so I'm limited as far as how much solution I can add. Also, if my Ca consumption remains where it is, adding enough kalk to support the Alk consumption would have me adding more Ca than I need...if I reduced the saturation of the solution to match Ca consumption I'd still have to supplement with manually dosing Alk...which is what I'm trying to avoid in the first place. Overall, the whole kalk + vinegar in my ATO just sounds almost as much of a headache as manual dosing.
Am I getting ahead of myself in considering manually dosing for a few weeks to get a handle on things, then picking up an auto-doser? Or should I just give the kalk a try and watch my levels? I'd rather not invest in a kalk stirrer to run in-line with my ATO...am I putting the tank at an unnecessary risk if I try to just add kalk to the ATO reservoir and call it a day? Just trying to get a consensus as I've come across 100 opinions on the subject. I'm definitely leaning towards a dosing pump since it'd give me better control of my levels...especially considering that the evaporation rate varies significantly in my tank day-to-day.
Thanks for putting up with my long post :stupid:
Thoughts?
