Can you get away with just kalk?

[Fliger]

Does anyone with a lot of SPS get away with just dosing kalkwasser? Has anyone been able to keep up with ca/alk long term with just a kalk reactor?

And does anyone believe that this method will lead to thinner SPS structures, as a few have suggested?

http://www.reefcentral.com/forums/showthread.php?s=&threadid=848221

 

[AcroSteve]

I think if your evaporation is high enough, you could do it.

 

[turtlespd]

I have kept a 150g semi packed sps tank with Kalk only. In the begining i set my kalk reactor to not spin as much and all my top off went through it. My ca was pretty high at 490 ish but things seemed find. As soon as the sps started to grow i let them consume calcium till it was steady 380 where i wanted it at. When i noticed that ca beging to drop alittle lower i added more kalk to my reactor and set it do it spins more. This helped for about 6 months finally consumtion go alittle high so i added a fan on a timer which kept it in check and eventually had the fan going full time. I then decided on a reactor because my tank was going nuts but keeping a tank with Kalk only does work and my tank was packed. You just need to keep evaporation and top off Ca saturated 100% of the time and that takes some tinkering. As far as thinner sps and kalk, thats a first i ever heard of that happening. I had really thick sps but i think the key was because i had SS pointed directy at the corals.
As far as long term with Kalk. I went 2 years Kalk only.

Paul

 

[Dan Fagan]

You need to monitor your Ca demand in order to answer that question.

If your Ca drops consistently under your current regimen, you could try to evaporate more as Steve suggested and increase the Kalk/ topoff dosage (Assuming pH does not get too affected).

But to answer your question, yes. IMO thinner structures seem to form when there is less flow...

 

[JMBoehling]

So far so good for me.. Just Mrs. Wages and BB.. I think many run into issues when the substrate accumulates Detritus and is begins to suck up the Calcium and Alk.