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Ca reactor not keeping up

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pgordemer

Officer Emeritus
Officer Emeritus
It takes a lot of MG to make a dent to the number you are shooting for, but once there, it will be easy to maintain.

Once you get there, you will find that you probably only need 15-20 ounces a month to stay there.

Remember you CA reactor job is to keep the CA/ALK levels the same, not to make it go up or down. Use 2 part solutions to make changes up and down, and the CA reactor does nothing for MG.

http://www.bulkreefsupply.com/Calcium,-Alkalinity-&-Magnesium/c1/index.html
 
S

stcreef

what the 100,000ppm means is that only 10% of the solution is actual mag. The rest is sulfates, chlorides and water. Probably close to 60%-70% water if not more depending on what the actual mag they are using.

So for your 120 gallons you need about 123ml of pure mag to boost your levels. So using a 10% solution you need 10 times that amount.
 
T

TheGuyFromNJ

well I'm off to find some Mg. Aquarium center near me has it for $10 for a 250ml bottle, not much of a deal. I would like to start fixing this today so I am going to use mail order as a last resort.
 
S

stcreef

You could use just epsom salt and ro water as long as you only use it this one time to bring it up. 8 cups of epsom and enough RO to make 1 gallon. Shake thoroughly. Then you'll need about 2600ml of this to bring you up to 1350ppm. You can get epsom salt almost anyplace.

If you keep using just epsom salt over and over, you would be adding way to much sulfates. But for a one time shot you would be fine.
 
T

TheGuyFromNJ

stcreef said:
You could use just epsom salt and ro water as long as you only use it this one time to bring it up. 8 cups of epsom and enough RO to make 1 gallon. Shake thoroughly. Then you'll need about 2600ml of this to bring you up to 1350ppm. You can get epsom salt almost anyplace.

If you keep using just epsom salt over and over, you would be adding way to much sulfates. But for a one time shot you would be fine.
Click to expand...

I probably have epsom salt around here already. I was reading about that, but was concerned about the sulfates. But I guess you can't get any mag that doesn't contain some sulfates.

I will mix up a batch and post again after I test in a few hours.
 
T

TheGuyFromNJ

well that definitely raised the Mg. I kinda over shot it a bit. I planned on a water change tomorrow anyway. Will report in the afternoon with the readings after the water change.
 
T

TheGuyFromNJ

Sorry it took so long for the update, but I have been doing a lot with the tank lately. Over the weekend we completely disassembled the tank, removed all the corals and rock. Had the wife clean the tank of all the sediment she could find, and I washed every rock in a tub of heated SW with a few power heads in it. After only 13 hours of scraping, cleaning, scaping, and gluing all the corals in place, everything was back in the tank. Of course now when I look at the tank I don't like the way it turned out, but its there for good now. I find it amazing there is almost 200# of rock in the 90 and it still only goes 1/2 way up the tank. Over the past week I have slowly been bringing my parameters up and now I think I have everything where is needs to be.

KH: 170ppm
CA: 460ppm
MG: 1320ppm

The KH seems a little high, but I haven't dosed with kalk in the past week.

I am now keeping a better log of levels so this drop doesn't happen in the future. I also switched to Oceanic salt because the RC salt seems to have low MG, with the last batch testing at about 960ppm at 1.026.

Thanks to all for the valuable info in this thread, and in helping me sort this problem out.
 
T

TheGuyFromNJ

So with the Ca reactor running about as fast as recommended I am still seeing that it is not keeping up.

It is set up as follows:
effluent ph 6.8
CO2 120-130 bpm
effluent is a small steady stream

Here are my levels over the past 3 days, no water changes have been done in the past 3 days, only topping off via ATO with RO. For some reason there was a sharp drop in Mg between yesterday afternoon and this afternoon. All reading were done about the same time of day. Is it normal for the Mg to drop 120ppm in a day?

As you can see the Ca is steady dropping too.



Date
MG
KH
Ca


11/11
1360
170
460


11/12
1360
170
440


11/13
1180
150
400



I am going to dose again with Mg and test again tomorrow.

What am I not understanding about this?
 
S

stcreef

a drop that fast would indicate a testing error. either human or with the test kit itself. see if you can borrow one to confirm your findings.
 
S

stcreef

I just re read through this thread. A suggestion. Stop dripping the kalk. Only use RO for your ATO for a week. Bring your parameters back up manually. Then watch your parameters. Measure a few times a day. What may be happening and causing you frustrations is the kalk in the ATO may be bringing you over the precip line causing your parameters to drop suddenly as well as causing the floaters you are seeing.

I would measure your parameters a few times a day for a few days after you make these changes. If you see a sudden change from one to the other, then some event occurred. If you see gradual changes, then you can adjust your equipment as needed.

I had this problem a few times with kalk, it would happen during the day when no one was around to see the event. Evap was high because lights were on and room temps were higher, so more kalk was being added. Now I only ATO with RO/DI and drip kalk at night.
 
T

TheGuyFromNJ

stcreef said:
I just re read through this thread. A suggestion. Stop dripping the kalk. Only use RO for your ATO for a week. Bring your parameters back up manually. Then watch your parameters. Measure a few times a day. What may be happening and causing you frustrations is the kalk in the ATO may be bringing you over the precip line causing your parameters to drop suddenly as well as causing the floaters you are seeing.

I would measure your parameters a few times a day for a few days after you make these changes. If you see a sudden change from one to the other, then some event occurred. If you see gradual changes, then you can adjust your equipment as needed.

I had this problem a few times with kalk, it would happen during the day when no one was around to see the event. Evap was high because lights were on and room temps were higher, so more kalk was being added. Now I only ATO with RO/DI and drip kalk at night.
Click to expand...

The day after I posted this I cleaned my ATO tub, for the past week or so I have only been topping off with RO. (as I have been posting)

I did bring my parameters up manually to normal levels but they only lasted a day. The following day the ca was lowering and the alk was lowering even though the ca reactor was running full bore.
 
S

stcreef

thats the effluent or is that the display water? If the effluent, I would think the KH and Ca would be alot higher. Your just pumping water through it. The alk of the effluent of the reactor should be up around 25dkh/450ppm, dont sweat measuring the Ca, that will balance with the Alk. So with what you measured I would say you have no reaction in the Ca reactor.
 
T

TheGuyFromNJ

That was the effluent right out of the reactor and it is going through a lot of co2.
What adjustments do I have to do to the reactor to make it react other than control it with the controller and keep co2 going through it. Could the effluent be running through too fast for a reaction to take place? At the risk of using a 5lb tank every 3 months should I lower the ph inside the reactor?
 
S

stcreef

Is there anyway you can post a pic of your reactor setup and label which lines are what? Maybe you have something hooked up wrong. And when was the last time your ph probe was calibrated?
 
T

TheGuyFromNJ

I pic probably wouldn't show much, but I will explain how it is hooked up.

The cylinder is being controlled by Milwaukee SMS122 (set at 6.9), that was calibrated with 4 and 7 solution about 7 months ago. The line from the cylinder goes to a bubble counter (120bpm) then into the chamber. The chamber is filled with ARM, about 7 months old. The reactor is being fed with an Aqualifter (3.5gph). There is a eheim 1046 79gph recirc pump under the chamber. The effluent comes out of the reactor and into a drip container with a small amount of ARM in it to use up any remaining CO2. I know CO2 is going into the reactor because I can hear it going through the recirc pump.

I think I covered everything. I am going to have the CO2 refilled tomorrow, and I will probably change out the media too.

If I missed anything don't hesitate to ask. Thanks again for your help.
 
S

stcreef

Ok then I would say back to basics.....fresh media, recalibrate the pH probe. In the meantime you will have to supplement daily the alk and ca manually. But its important to try to keep consistent levels manually during setup. Set the effluent for about one drop per second and the co2 to about 10-15 bubbles per minute. Let that run for about an hour or two. The pH should have dropped at this point. Take a sample of the effluent and test the alk. If its not above 25 dkh/445ppm you dont have enough co2. Increase the bubble count of the co2. You should try to get between 30-50dkh before making any other adjustments. Once that occurs, let it run and test the DT a few times a day. If the DT drops, manually correct the tank with additives. Then up the effluent drips a bit. Let it run an hour or two and check the alk. Increase the co2 to achieve 30-50 dkh. Let that run a few days testing the DT a few times a day. Keep doing this over and over til you are maintaining your alk and calcium. But keep manually correcting the DT with additives til the cal reactor is maintaining it.
 
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