Alk Staying Low

[TORX]

My alk is 6 and has been for a while. I have been raising the dosing amount over the last few weeks and am up to 200ml alk and 200ml calcium as of tonight. Calcium is high, I can not recall the number right now, but according to dosing rules, the calcium should stay high and should stay equal dosing until alk is up. I am still showing 6 alk on 2 different tests. NYOS and ELOS tests. Both are new and not expired.

 

[TheGreenStag]

My alk is 6 and has been for a while. I have been raising the dosing amount over the last few weeks and am up to 200ml alk and 200ml calcium as of tonight. Calcium is high, I can not recall the number right now, but according to dosing rules, the calcium should stay high and should stay equal dosing until alk is up. I am still showing 6 alk on 2 different tests. NYOS and ELOS tests. Both are new and not expired.

Thts low how are your corals ok


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[Pistol]

Are you dosing LaCl

 

[teebone110]

You should check your mag, what's the reading?

If it's low, this could be the issue

 

[shiftline]

If your mag is out of whack it will mess with the balance. Think of magnesium lime the referee. Make sure it's in the 1200-1400 range


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[TORX]

Are you dosing LaCl

I am not. I stopped that a while ago. Shortly after I started using it, I started getting clear snot bacteria clogging up my sump. I was dosing through my skimmer as there is an extra port to feed into the skimmer pump. It did work well to lower P04, but the clear snot was really a PITA. Once I stopped the LaCl, the snot went away on its own.

Thts low how are your corals ok

All my softies, LPS and zoas are doing great. Most of my SPS is doing great as well, but I have a few pieces that are not growing and some that are bleaching out.

If your mag is out of whack it will mess with the balance. Think of magnesium lime the referee. Make sure it's in the 1200-1400 range

You should check your mag, what's the reading?

If it's low, this could be the issue

Just tested...
Mag - 1440 (turned off dosing last night for this, will lower the dosing and start it back up in a few days when testing a little lower.
Cal - 650

I was under the impression that Alk and Cal worked together and relied on each other. That is why most places sell it as 2 part. You are supposed to raise them together if one is low, always dosing the same amount and eventually they will come together. In my case, the calcium has continued to go up (tested on 2 different test kits, ELOS and NYOS, same result) and the ALK has not moved. I am using Fauna Marin Balling salts. Maybe @BIGSHOW, as BigShowFrags is the main supplier of FM, has some incite as well?

 

[Steve Peters]

I struggled to maintain balance until I was able to keep my pH up (low ALK, high CAL, pH 7.6-7.9). I ran a fresh air line outside and attached to skimmer intake and now my pH stays around 8.1 and my Alk 10, CAL 440. Not sure this is what made the change but that was the only thing I did differently. This was over a year ago and things have remained stable since. I would also double check MAG with another test kit as others stated.

 

[Josh]

Try lowering the flow through your GFO reactor, ALLEGEDLY GFO will sap alk in this manner if you are running high gpm through your GFO reactor.

Not even sure if you use GFO.....

 

[TORX]

Try lowering the flow through your GFO reactor, ALLEGEDLY GFO will sap alk in this manner if you are running high gpm through your GFO reactor.

Not even sure if you use GFO.....

From the Product Review: Two Little Fishies' Media Reactor 150 and PhosBan Phosphate and Silica Adsorption Media - By Dana Riddle

"Effects on Alkalinity
Directions for use of the PhosBan Reactor state that alkalinity will drop when 5x the recommended amount of PhosBan is used. Under the conditions of this experiment, alkalinity dropped by about 19% when PhosBan was applied at about twice the recommended amount. At face value, this may seem negative until we consider that the presence of both phosphorus and silica lend to alkalinity (Standard Methods, 1998). Therefore, a portion of alkalinity drop could be attributable to their removal, and results generated by alkalinity testing in this situation could be partially attributed to removal of 'false' alkalinity and not a drop in carbonate content."

For this testing, they grossly increased the recommended dosage of GFO. I am using the recommended dosage for my TWV (Total Water Volume). My phosphates are at 0.025, so I may try shutting down the reactor. I think the media is about spent as well, it has been on the same canister for 4 weeks. I reached out to Ian and hopefully he can hook me up with some media other then gfo to reduce phosphates. I need something else anyways as GFO shouldnt be used on seahorse tanks and I would like to drop it there as well.

 

[shamous113]

I'm having a similar problem, when I was reading about it two things came up. coralline algae consuming more alk then calcium but I haven't found any studies proving this. the other is the Nitrogen Cycle where the alkalinity is lost in the conversion of ammonia to nitrate

One of the best known chemical cycles in aquaria is the nitrogen cycle. In it, ammonia excreted by fish and other organisms is converted into nitrate. This conversion produces acid, H+ (or uses alkalinity depending on how one chooses to look at it), as shown in equation 1:

1. 
   (1) NH3 + 2O2 à NO3- + H+ + H2O

For each ammonia molecule converted into nitrate, one hydrogen ion (H+) is produced. If nitrate is allowed to accumulate to 50 ppm, the addition of this acid will deplete 0.8 meq/L (2.3 dKH) of alkalinity.

However, the news is not all bad. When this nitrate proceeds further along the nitrogen cycle, depleted alkalinity is returned in exactly the amount lost. For example, if the nitrate is allowed to be converted into N2 in a sand bed, one of the products is bicarbonate, as shown in equation 2 (below) for the breakdown of glucose and nitrate under typical anoxic conditions as might happen in a deep sand bed:

1. 
   (2) 4NO3- + 5/6 C6H12O6 (glucose) + 4H2O à 2 N2 + 7H2O + 4HCO3- + CO2
   

In equation 2 we see that exactly one bicarbonate ion is produced for each nitrate ion consumed. Consequently, the alkalinity gain is 0.8 meq/L (2.3 dKH) for every 50 ppm of nitrate consumed.

Likewise, equation 3 (below) shows the uptake of nitrate and CO2 into macroalgae to form typical organic molecules:

1. 
   (3) 122 CO2 + 122 H2O + 16 NO3- à C106H260O106N16 + 138 O2 + 16 HCO3-
   

Again, one bicarbonate ion is produced for each nitrate ion consumed.

It turns out that as long as the nitrate concentration is stable, regardless of its actual value, there is no ongoing net depletion of alkalinity. Of course, alkalinity was depleted to reach that value, but once it stabilizes, there is no continuing alkalinity depletion because the export processes described above are exactly balancing the depletion from nitrification (the conversion of ammonia to nitrate).

There are, however, circumstances where the alkalinity is lost in the conversion of ammonia to nitrate, and is never returned. The most likely scenario to be important in reef aquaria is when nitrate is removed through water changes. In that case, each water change takes out some nitrate, and if the system produces nitrate to get back to some stable level, the alkalinity again becomes depleted.

If, for example, nitrate averages 50 ppm at each water change, then over the course of a year with 10 water changes of 20% each, the alkalinity will be depleted by 1.6 meq/L (4.5 dKH) over the course of that entire time period. This process is one of the primary reasons that fish-only aquaria that often export nitrate in water changes need occasional buffer additions to replace that depleted alkalinity.

While the magnitude of the depletion described in the paragraph above is fairly easy to understand, it also can be converted into units that clarify the imbalance. The impact of alkalinity depletion on the calcium and alkalinity demand balance depends, of course, on the amount of calcium and alkalinity added (and consumed) over the course of that same year.

For a typical reef aquarium (assuming a daily addition of saturated limewater equal to 2% of the tank's volume), the amount of alkalinity added during the course of a year is 297.8 meq/L. Likewise, the amount of calcium added is 5,957 ppm Ca++, given the ratio of 1 meq/L of alkalinity for every 20 ppm of calcium that has been discussed above. If that 1.6 meq/L of alkalinity is added to create a larger demand of 299.4 meq/L over the course of a year, the new ratio for the total demand becomes 19.90 ppm Ca++ per 1 meq/L of alkalinity. Consequently, while this effect of nitrate production on alkalinity is enough to be noticed over the course of a year, it is substantially smaller than the other effects discussed in this article, and is unimportant for aquaria that maintain low nitrate levels.

 

[TORX]

I'm having a similar problem, when I was reading about it two things came up. coralline algae consuming more alk then calcium but I haven't found any studies proving this. the other is the Nitrogen Cycle where the alkalinity is lost in the conversion of ammonia to nitrate

Very good read and bit of information. My nitrates are too high right now, but not that high, just higher then I like at 10ppm. I have stopped water changes as of about 2 months ago. Using Fauna Marin Balling Salts with added Elements I have not done a water change that long. I will keep this in my back pocket for sure.

 

[thehvacman]

Sounds like you have lost your balance for sure. Aquavitros balance does a good job at raising ph and balancing Calcium and alk ratios. I used it to get my numbers inline then you don't need it.

 

[shamous113]

@TORX have you checked you stock solutions strength to make sure their the strength they should be?

 

[TORX]

@TORX have you checked you stock solutions strength to make sure their the strength they should be?

Meaning test my alk solution in my doser? No I have not. How would I go about That?

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[shamous113]

Meaning test my alk solution in my doser? No I have not. How would I go about That?

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you would take some of the stock solution and dilute it with ro water so you can measure it with the test kits you have. ie your stock solution is 100 units, you can test to 10 units. if you want to make 20ml of new testing solution at 10 units then you will need 2ml of stock and 18ml of ro water.

 

[TORX]

Anyone know the stock concentration on Fauna Marin Alk? Quick search isn't bringing anything up and it is not listed on the container.

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[shamous113]

randy's DIY 2part is

Recipe #1, Part 2: The Alkalinity Part

Spread baking soda (594 grams or about 2 ¼ cups) on a baking tray and heat in an ordinary oven at 300°F for one hour to drive off water and carbon dioxide. Overheating is not a problem, either with higher temperatures or longer times. Dissolve the residual solid in enough water to make 1 gallon total. This dissolution may require a fair amount of mixing. Warming it speeds dissolution. This solution will contain about 1,900 meq/L of alkalinity (5,300 dKH).

 

[TORX]

That would make a alkalinity solution, I am wondering how to test my specific solution. I do not know my stock solution is in order to start the calculation. I have asked on their forum and hoping to get a response. If I use the 18ml RO and 2ml solution, that tests off the charts, I stopped testing after it hit 12dkh.

On a plus, testing alk this morning I am up to 7dkh. But that is dosing 200ml still.

 

[Njord]

Water change about 25% I would use the Red Sea Coral salt, and start using Rowa Phos. I had to use it on my 15 nano ( very unstable and daily testing is a lake or break) long story short every thing was about as good as possible within ~ 24 hours

 

[TORX]

Did a more accurate test this morning and it was 7.5dkh. At 8 dkh now. Dropped my doser to 150ml and will test a few times tomorrow as i have the day off again. I really think that the gfo was a factor here. @Salty Cracker you ever experience alk issues?

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