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Ash's 400 Gallon Reef

A

Ashish

Jamie S said:
Yes I do have some hardy acros but Chris Mekley at aci aquaculture says he worries more about pH than Alk. I’m pretty nervous myself and have my fingers crossed.
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Yeah Chris said that because if your PH is high and stable it will help keep your Alk stable. I think you have to focus on Alk first ,then PH! If I was in your situation, i would try getting that Alk down to what they are used to. The issue with Acros is they rarely react quickly to stress., where Non-SPS will react more quickly. Its because softies and some LPS can better adjust how much light their zoothelle can take where as SPS are fully exposed to light and can't adjust to changes as good. Also, Alk does not really stabilize, it just stays where it is until it gets consumed over time.

In my Frag tank the SPS are not doing all that great given they came from 7.9Dkh tank and thrown into a tank with 9.8DKH. In my 400 gallon (with no corals), my Alk is 10.1DKH. Since i already know this won't work for my acros I have to figure out how to drop it down to 8.0 DKH (Id be happier at 7 - 7.5DKH), system volume is 550 gallon so won't be an easy task!
 
A

Ashish

diana a said:
I have the same pump and love it
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How long have you been using it? What are you dosing with it? They are actually out of stock, Thankfully that pet place had them and I probably should buy one more before the price goes up t $250, which it surely will.
 
diana a

diana a

Staff member
NJRC Member
Moderator
I was so use to dosing two part by hand. Dosing All for Reef (with doser)for the last 9 months. I got the doser on July 16th 2021 and it sat in the box. Started using it July 2nd 2022. I was forced to use it because I had to go to our condo in Florida and didn't trust my boys to dose the tank.

I mixed some IORC yesterday but the alk is at 10. My tank has not had a water change since Christmas. Everything is happy at the current alk of 7. I ordered Loudwolf sodium bisulfate to bring the alk down. Will let you know how that works

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Ashish said:

How long have you been using it? What are you dosing with it? They are actually out of stock, Thankfully that pet place had them and I probably should buy one more before the price goes up t $250, which it surely will.​

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A

Ashish

diana a said:
I was so use to dosing two part by hand. Dosing All for Reef (with doser)for the last 9 months. I got the doser on July 16th 2021 and it sat in the box. Started using it July 2nd 2022. I was forced to use it because I had to go to our condo in Florida and didn't trust my boys to dose the tank.

I mixed some IORC yesterday but the alk is at 10. My tank has not had a water change since Christmas. Everything is happy at the current alk of 7. I ordered Loudwolf sodium bisulfate to bring the alk down. Will let you know how that works

​

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never heard of Loudwolf sodium, do you know if that brings down the PH or can be used immediately after dosing?

I have to do the same on big tank as the Alks at 10DKH.
Muratic acid is the only thing i can use effectively right now. My game plan is have 2 large 65 gallon barrels and bring down the DKH in one barrel low as possible. maybe 4-5DKH. and just keep swapping the tank water with the lower Alk water until it drops to desired range. Id love 7.5DKH but would settle for 8.5DKH. This method just requires alot of patients since im probably gonna need 2-3 days to bring the PH back up.

Side note: Muratic acid is very easy to use, its like I am using Vinegar, but I always wear safety glasses and respirator and get some fresh air inside the basement. I dont trust any fumes on our delicate human body,
 
A

Ashish

I am going to florida for 8 days. (Pompao Beach, cape coral, and orlando)
I am going to live my best life in Florida When I went to Orlando in 2018 I bought this really thick thermal from WWC to smuggle my acros back on the plane. this think kept the temperature of the water spot on the entire way home and it was in a checked bag. Highly recommend!

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diana a

diana a

Staff member
NJRC Member
Moderator
Ashish said:
never heard of Loudwolf sodium, do you know if that brings down the PH or can be used immediately after dosing?

I have to do the same on big tank as the Alks at 10DKH.
Muratic acid is the only thing i can use effectively right now. My game plan is have 2 large 65 gallon barrels and bring down the DKH in one barrel low as possible. maybe 4-5DKH. and just keep swapping the tank water with the lower Alk water until it drops to desired range. Id love 7.5DKH but would settle for 8.5DKH. This method just requires alot of patients since im probably gonna need 2-3 days to bring the PH back up.

Side note: Muratic acid is very easy to use, its like I am using Vinegar, but I always wear safety glasses and respirator and get some fresh air inside the basement. I dont trust any fumes on our delicate human body,
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Yes will bring down your pH.

When alkalinity is too high in new salt water or in a display tank, acid can be used to lower the alkalinity. You can easily use muriatic acid (hydrochloric acid), or sodium bifulfate or sulfuric acid (but that one is harder to get for hobbyists).

Note that all of these methods reduce pH a lot (and to the same extent), until you aerate adequately, so go very slow in a display and aerate a lot to drive off the excess CO2 that is generated.
 
E

ericrodriguez

I personally would not add anything to bring my alk down at least it’s like 12dkh. I would lower the doses a bit until desirable alk is achieved then back to normal!!!
 
diana a

diana a

Staff member
NJRC Member
Moderator
For at least 4 years I have been using Red Sea Pro. That mixes to 12 °dKH. My SPS (90% of my tank) were very pale when dKH is too high and I didn't know that was the cause until just recently by accident. I have Red Sea Pro salt I need to use up and have no choice but to bring down the dKH before I do a water change.
 
H

horseplay

NJRC Member
A 5-10% WC will not have a big impact to the ALK level. The excess is quickly used up. I never try to match the alk level of the new water to tank. My tank consumes about 0.3 dkh/day.
 
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ericrodriguez

I think the way Diana it’s doing it it’s a good way, because coral will not experience any alk swims. Although I agree that coral will easily use the excess
 
A

Ashish

Yesterday I decided to add 30 ML of muratic acid to about 10 gallons of saltwater and PH dropped to 3.6 Today its at 4.0 - I am curious to see how long it takes to get back up and safely do a waterchange to bring the alk to 7-8dkh.

I'll run a test with this water and see how many gallons at what DKH i would to make to bring my 400 gallons alk down. I sometimes wonder if it would make more sense to just drip the muratic acid in the display very slow and monitor PH. instead of dosing a large amount in 65 gallon drum and depressing the PH so much it may take 5 days for PH to stabilize.
 
A

Ashish

I got my PAR meter to work (finally) and tested the PAR in my QT. I was shocked to see my SPS where in very low PAR, maybe 30-45 Range and Zoas and LPS are even lower. I kind of suspected low light with the way the Zoas where opening wide to get light. I bumped the intensity to 80% and SPS will have about 100-150 PAR range. Once I add T5 I'll probably just have them on for 3 hrs per day and acclimate them slowly to T5. I feel the spread on T5 is much better and the corals may bleach if not done slowly. I am just about ready to start dosing Kalk via Doser to my QT. I have a 30 gallon barrel and just wanted to make a water level indicator so holding off bc I hear potency goes down if exposed to Air so dont want have to guess when I need to fill it. Eventually I am just going to use a 65 gallon drum for display and QT to dose kalk.
 
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