I've Been Dosing Only One Part of Two-Part - What Now?

[jonnybravo22]

Hey everyone.

So I did not (still do not) fully understand how two-part works. I have been using b-ionic for some time now. I thought that if I wanted to hit my ALK and CAL targets, that I would be dosing them in different quantities, so for many months I'd done just that. More recently, I wanted to raise my CAL but thought my ALK was ok so I dosed ONLY CAL.

Well then I learned that my system, given it has higher nutrients, should be targeting a higher ALK. So for weeks I've been dosing ONLY ALK.

My levels are currently:

1.024 sg (refractometer, calibrated)
9.86 ALK (Hanna)
500 CAL (Elos)
0.071 P04 (Hanna)
5ppm N03 (API)

55g display + 70g rubbermaid sump
115g estimated total system volume

My questions:

1. What should I be doing now? Dosing ALK only to catch up or dosing both?
2. Is what I described wrong about how to use this? Or do you just dose both until you hit the ALK target and let CAL be whatever its going to be?
3. Since I dosed just CAL before, I assume my "ionic balance" is off. What does that practically mean for sps corals? Do they care as long as levels of each are high?
4. If my salt mixes up to something outside the range I'm looking for can or should two-part be used to bump up one of the two levels independent of the other to get a new "Baseline" and then dosed in balance from there?

Clearly I still have some basic questions here about the chemistry of two-part so any help (or links to existing explanations) is appreciated! I recently read one that says there is never any reason to dose individually because then you're "out of balance" but did not explain further what impact that has or why that is a bad thing, if it is.

 

[bertoni]

I think those levels are fine as is. I wouldn't worry much.

There's really no such concept as "ionic balance" involved here. As long as the values are in the recommended range, the corals should be fine.

I expect that the consumption rate is low enough that water changes can keep the calcium level up. The consumption rate is 2.8 dKH per 20 ppm of calcium, so it can take a lot of consumption to see much happening, particularly with the calcium level up that high.

What's the highest level that the kit will detect? How much is being dosed per day, and what's the water volume of the tank?

 

[jonnybravo22]

Thanks. Added volume to the post.

55g display + 70g rubbermaid sump
115g estimated total system volume

It's a titration test so presumably no upper limit? Sensitivity to 10ppm.

So are you saying that 2 part can be dosed independently as long as each individual level is in a good range?

 

[kevin_e]

Yes. It's a calcium product and an alk product. The term 2 part is misleading in a sense. For consumption purposes, they are used at certain ratios and dosing both in theory maintains stable numbers despite consumption.

In your case, trying to raise one to a target number, it's fine to just use one. But it's not something I would suggest long term.

Sent from my XT1080 using Tapatalk

 

[bertoni]

So are you saying that 2 part can be dosed independently as long as each individual level is in a good range?

Yes, exactly.

Anything up to about 150 ml per day is a reasonable dose. For volumes much smaller than that, water change might be enough to keep up with calcium consumption.

 

[Tripod1404]

On top of what is already said. I think your tank has high enough alk for the given nutirinet levels.

I have N at 3-4 ppm and P at ~0.02 ppm, I cannot go more than 8 dKH without burning the SPS corals.

 

[Uncle99]

And I am sure you know, don't dose Alk and Calc at the same time, day apart is nice.
Alk seems to be used up about 7-9 times faster than Calc.

Mag?
What's the read on this.

BRSTV had a neat little you-tube video on this which might be helpful

To me, I like to dose as little as needed, I work the water changes which for the most part, keeps the three calcifiers in line, less chance for mistake. I use RED SEA PRO, Mixed Reef Salt, it mixes up high in the range so dosing for me is rare.

 

[Tripod1404]

And I am sure you know, don't dose Alk and Calc at the same time, day apart is nice.
Alk seems to be used up about 7-9 times faster than Calc.

I dose alk and calcium 5 minutes apart from each other. It wont be a problem as long as the water turnover is high enough to allow dosed solutions to mix.

Also calcium carbonate is made out of equal amounts of calcium and carbonate. So they are consumed at more or less at the same rate. You would see that if you convert dKH to ppm carbonate. 1dKH is roughly 18ppm carbonate, so a drop in 1dKH equals to a drop of 18 ppm calcium.

To me, I like to dose as little as needed, I work the water changes which for the most part, keeps the three calcifiers in line, less chance for mistake. I use RED SEA PRO, Mixed Reef Salt, it mixes up high in the range so dosing for me is rare.

You are lucky, I use the same salt but I need to dose a gallon of calcium and alk solutions between water changes.

 

[Uncle99]

I dose alk and calcium 5 minutes apart from each other. It wont be a problem as long as the water turnover is high enough to allow dosed solutions to mix.

Also calcium carbonate is made out of equal amounts of calcium and carbonate. So they are consumed at more or less at the same rate. You would see that if you convert dKH to ppm carbonate. 1dKH is roughly 18ppm carbonate, so a drop in 1dKH equals to a drop of 18 ppm calcium.



You are lucky, I use the same salt but I need to dose a gallon of calcium and alk solutions between water changes.

Now I am getting really confused?
In order to maintain my ALK at 10, and my calcium at 440, and my mag at 1360, daily, I dose 10ml for ALK, every second day, 3ml for Calc and weekly 5ml for Mg.

Does this not mean that in some way, ALK is lowering faster than calcium?

 

[Tripod1404]

Now I am getting really confused?
In order to maintain my ALK at 10, and my calcium at 440, and my mag at 1360, daily, I dose 10ml for ALK, every second day, 3ml for Calc and weekly 5ml for Mg.

Does this not mean that in some way, ALK is lowering faster than calcium?

Your calcium solution is probably more concentrated, so you dose less.

 

[bertoni]

Now I am getting really confused?
In order to maintain my ALK at 10, and my calcium at 440, and my mag at 1360, daily, I dose 10ml for ALK, every second day, 3ml for Calc and weekly 5ml for Mg.

Does this not mean that in some way, ALK is lowering faster than calcium?

Even if you are using a two-part, those dosing levels sounds very small, and water changes might be enough to keep the calcium and magnesium levels up, without any dosing at all. We'd need to know the water volume and the exact products you're using to start to guess what's happening.

There are some processes that consume alkalinity but not calcium:

http://reefkeeping.com/issues/2004-12/rhf/index.htm

 

[Uncle99]

Using seachem Pre-mixed Alk and Calc which I thought would be around the same concentrate.

Thanks so much for the link, let me read this carefully.

Before reading my understanding was that Alk can fall faster than calcium, made this article will enlighten me more on the subject

 

[Uncle99]

Yup, thank you, this article is right on point.
It seems that my imbalance may just be an illusion do to serval factors outside the 1 to 1 uptake by corals.
I will need to study this in more detail.
This was a big help, less confused now, but not absolutely there yet.

 

[bertoni]

I'm glad the article helped.