2 part Dosing ?'s

[Palting]

My coral are finally consuming faster than WC's can replace. So I'm looking into 2 part dosing, and I'm a little confused. Looking for the experts to un-confuse me . Thanks in advance!

I thought you calculate the weekly (or so) consumption rate, and dose appropriately spread out over the same period. BUT, you have to dose part 1 and part 2 separately? How do you dose continuously but separately? I must be misunderstanding something.

 

[shifty51008]

i have a dual dosing pump that doses cal and alk. at diffrent times of the day.

the best way I figured out is to test once a day for a week and find out how much cal. and alk the tank is using per day then dose that ammount each day in a high flow area of the sump.

 

[Palting]

Hmmmm. Automate the dosing to dose at different times of the day, or manually dose daily, the calculated daily dose, at different times of the day. So, run the daily dose for part one over 6 hours, a 6 hour break, then run the daily dose for part 2 over the next 6 hours, repeat daily, or something like that?

 

[username in use]

How you go about it will really depend on your overall demand. I dose manually once a day. I dump the alk in the sump and the cal in the DT and im done in under 30 sec. I use Bulk Reef supply 2 part with their bottles that have built in measuring cups. I dose about 12mls of each. If you need to do large amounts I would look into automating it.

 

[The Punisher]

The best way I've found to dose two part is with 2 dosing pumps. You figure out how much you need to dose on the 2 part calculator and then figure out how long you need to run the dosing pumps to get that amount into your tank. The dosing pumps from BRS are 1.1 ml/min pumps so if you need 11 ml/day you would run the pump for 10 minutes a day. You may have two different amounts so you would set one to run for say 10 minutes and one to run for 15 minutes. Hope that makes sense.

 

[Memeber007]

I would just start with recommended starting dose on the bottles. Test your CA and ALK levels every day for the next week and just adjust the dose as needed it. It seems complicated at first, but it is really simple.

 

[Palting]

How you go about it will really depend on your overall demand. I dose manually once a day. I dump the alk in the sump and the cal in the DT and im done in under 30 sec. I use Bulk Reef supply 2 part with their bottles that have built in measuring cups. I dose about 12mls of each. If you need to do large amounts I would look into automating it.

I have a feeling my demand is still fairly low, so I'll start with this technique. Thanks!

The best way I've found to dose two part is with 2 dosing pumps. You figure out how much you need to dose on the 2 part calculator and then figure out how long you need to run the dosing pumps to get that amount into your tank. The dosing pumps from BRS are 1.1 ml/min pumps so if you need 11 ml/day you would run the pump for 10 minutes a day. You may have two different amounts so you would set one to run for say 10 minutes and one to run for 15 minutes. Hope that makes sense.

Yup, makes absolute sense. Pump run time is dependent on required dose. For some reason, I was thinking pump run time is in hours, not minutes. DUHHH. LOL!

I would just start with recommended starting dose on the bottles. Test your CA and ALK levels every day for the next week and just adjust the dose as needed it. It seems complicated at first, but it is really simple.

I've have a log in an Excel file. That's how I found out water changes weren't cutting it anymore, since my alk has steadily been dropping, and Ca maybe dropping as well. I plan to get more detailed input to determine my dosing. Yeah, I feel like I'm trying to re-invent the wheel. Thanks for the encouragement!

 

[dch384]

i think B Ionic makes a two part doser it is a around $300

 

[Palting]

Yes, I saw it at one of the LFS down in Columbus, a complete kit. Simillar to BRS. I've read good comments on both. I guess I can't go wrong with either?