Dosing kalk
- Thread starter sergio706
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I dose kalk and have no issues. At some point I know that I will need to go back to 2 part or use a calcium reactor as the calcium demand increases, but for now the kalk easily keeps up with my system and is a lot cheaper. I actually dose instead of adding it to the ato, but it is ok in the ato as well and I have used it my ato on a prolior smaller system. I also calibrate my ph probe on my apex more frequently when using kalk since the main danger with kalk is spiking the ph too high if the mix is way off, the dose pump gets stuck on, or if the stuff that settles to the bottom of the kalk resevoir starts getting sucked up for some reason. If the ph goes above 8.3 it is set to stop dosing. As of yet, I have not reached 8.3, but vary between 8.05 and 8.2. I have been ramping up my kalk dosage for a couple months now and tinkering with lighting schedules and air to further balance the ph in hopes of keeping it at 8.2 constantly.
Kalk is way cheaper than 2 part as long as your calcium demand is not too high.
Kalk is way cheaper than 2 part as long as your calcium demand is not too high.
Just be careful. I love my Tunze ATO but had the sensor fail once and it filled up to the mechanical "High Level" switch, the pump shut off and the alarm sounded. It worked perfectly and the only side effect was a minimal salinity swing. If kalk had been in the ATO it could have been a lot worse and I don't have a pH controller or probe that would have acted as a backup. I would only dose in an ATO if the ATO uses an optical sensor AND I had a backup pH controller of some sort.
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I've seen and heard of a bunch of people dosing kalk with their ato, even with a carx. I tried it but I just don't like relying on evaporation to control the dosing. So I tried dripping it but that is now labor intensive because you have to mix it up every day ,or two at the most. Now I'm planning on converting an old reactor into a kalk stirrer and adding it with doser. That way I know the metered amount added per day and can make easier adjustments as demand changes.
I definitely agee that some form of ph controller is an almost a must have for kalk. I also should have asked how large your system is. Kalk is not recomended for nano tanks due to the huge potential for large ph swings in a small volume of water. Also if your ato usage changes a lot between seasons, like mine does, kalk in the ato may be hard to keep up with.
I had my apex before I started using kalk, just by happenchance. While I and a lot of reefers have had no issue with kalk, it can be catastrophic if the ato gets stuck open and your ato resevoir is large. Using a seperate dosing mechanism definitely reduces the risk of an ato pump being stuck open or the level sensor reading incorrectly. I have been using a seperate doser for kalk since setting up my latest system. If you were already dosing 2 part, adding a slightly larger resevoir for kalk seperate from your ato may be easy.
I switched to kalk initially since I have historically had a hard time keeping my ph at or above 7.9 and kalk raises ph as a byproduct. If you have low ph and something larger than a nano, I would certainly consider kalkn but do agree some form of ph controller is highly recomended.
There are a lot of good articles on using kalk. The first one that comes up when I search is this one: BRS, which is not bad. If you are decent with chemistry there are some real good articles that go into the benefits of kalk, 2 part, and reactors out there, I believe holmes-farly had a paticularly good article on this.
If starting with kalk, start at a low dose solution mixture (maybe 1/4 strength) for kalk and work your way up, checking your parameters a couple times a week. For the first few days, I woukd check daily, at least the ph.
I had my apex before I started using kalk, just by happenchance. While I and a lot of reefers have had no issue with kalk, it can be catastrophic if the ato gets stuck open and your ato resevoir is large. Using a seperate dosing mechanism definitely reduces the risk of an ato pump being stuck open or the level sensor reading incorrectly. I have been using a seperate doser for kalk since setting up my latest system. If you were already dosing 2 part, adding a slightly larger resevoir for kalk seperate from your ato may be easy.
I switched to kalk initially since I have historically had a hard time keeping my ph at or above 7.9 and kalk raises ph as a byproduct. If you have low ph and something larger than a nano, I would certainly consider kalkn but do agree some form of ph controller is highly recomended.
There are a lot of good articles on using kalk. The first one that comes up when I search is this one: BRS, which is not bad. If you are decent with chemistry there are some real good articles that go into the benefits of kalk, 2 part, and reactors out there, I believe holmes-farly had a paticularly good article on this.
If starting with kalk, start at a low dose solution mixture (maybe 1/4 strength) for kalk and work your way up, checking your parameters a couple times a week. For the first few days, I woukd check daily, at least the ph.
Kalk can save money, but can also cause problems if not done carefully. Some things to consider-
Definitely start low and work your way up on dosage, measuring daily initially, until you get a handle on dosage rate & response.
If you use an ATO control to dose kalk, you will end up dosing more in winter than summer.
That's a problem. The drier air in winter increases evaporation rate vs summer (unless you max out your AC
I might suggest a dosing pump, IV bag, or other constant flow source adding water to the kalk container at a constant rate, and have the kalk solution go into the tank from there via an overflow.
The above is easy to control and a lot less fallible, imo.
Then add a separate ATO to your sump, if desired.
Definitely start low and work your way up on dosage, measuring daily initially, until you get a handle on dosage rate & response.
If you use an ATO control to dose kalk, you will end up dosing more in winter than summer.
That's a problem. The drier air in winter increases evaporation rate vs summer (unless you max out your AC
I might suggest a dosing pump, IV bag, or other constant flow source adding water to the kalk container at a constant rate, and have the kalk solution go into the tank from there via an overflow.
The above is easy to control and a lot less fallible, imo.
Then add a separate ATO to your sump, if desired.
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I do use kalk and a carx on one of my tanks. On the other I only use a carx. The kalk is added with a kalk reactor and a cheap doser every hour. If you don't have a lot of stony corals than you can just use kalk instead of 2part dosing but I find that it has a hard time keeping up with ca/alk demands in my tanks.
As mentioned above, I didn't want to rely on evaporation rates (ATO) as they vary so I use a kalk reactor and feed it through a doser timed to dose every hour. The water comes from my ATO reservoir on a different tap. Its on pause right now since its a fairly new setup and received recommendations to leave it alone for a bit. Will start back up in a few months.
