Kalk questions

MrSquid

MrSquid

New member
I've been struggling to keep my pH above 8.1 - even with buffering. I'm having problems keeping my alkalinity up (consistently around 5) ... even with adding Reef Carbonate. My calcium started fine (450) but is down to about 300 - and that's after a couple of water changes.

I picked up a jar of Kent kalk mix and am thinking of stopping the buffer and Reef Carbonate, but the kalk directions seem a bit vague. How do you guys suggest to start using it? Only through my ATO and gradually let everything ramp up? (my ATO goes through about 10g/week)

My ATO has a small pump that constantly circulates. Should I leave that running full-time with the kalk in it? Or is that separation you get with kalk key to the process?
 
there is a nice article on kalk in the chem forum. something like What your grandmother never told you about lime. check it out.

but no you wouldn't want to mix your kalk all the time. you want to dose the clear part and mixing it messes that up.
 
Thanks guys.

One question... how deep is the settled "slurry" compared to the usable kalk water? My reservoir is a 10g hex tank with a small pump in it - wondering how high I'll have to raise that pump up. But I probably won't know until I do it.

Also, how often do you guys stir your kalk water? I didn't see that mentioned in there. It'd get added with my ATO switch, so there's no good way to determine that it WOULDN'T be added while the stir pump is temporarily running. (unless I put timers on the ATO and the stir pump - but alternate their on/off times - so that when one's on, the other's off)
 
I put my eggcrate "floor" about 3" off the bottom of my container. seems to avoid any settled stuff.

I never stir mine. I mix it one time when I add the kalk and the water together and it settles. once you've got the clear water, you want to keep it still. any movement can introduce carbon dioxide which will reduce the effectiveness of the kalk.
 
I do kind of the same thing as Siropa! I mix my kalk and water up for about 15 minutes with a pump let it settle! I use a gravity fed ATO right now so my drain from the kalk container is about 2 inches off of the bottom! Every month or so I take my container and rinse the bottom of it all out and start over again!

Eric
 
I don't know you can take this with a grain of salt but I have been told ph is not one of the biggest problems. I can't get the ph in my tank to 7.8 I can get it higher if I add all kinds of stuff but I think that's worse than a low ph. You really need to find a balance if you mess with the alk you change the calcium and the other way around too so I guess you just need to find something that works for you and your critters.
 
Thanks guys. So if I do this, is my best bet to JUST start it through ATO makeup? Or is that actually the only way to do it?
 
So how long does it take for kalk to settle and separate? I shut down my ATO last night and added kalk around 8:30. Just checked it (9 hours later) and it's still cloudy through the whole tank - I can't see any settling happening at all. (I do see some solids on the base and the pump)
 
Squid,
It takes my bottle I mix kalk in about 24 hours to really settle out nice.

Maybe chemistry guru Bri Guy will chime in on this topic on how one thing effects the other. I am also with Mako on adding the minimum amount of stuff to your water to keep everyone happy. I have given up on getting my pH above 8.
 
Ya, don't worry about the pH so much, get your Alk and Ca in line first.

Right now my pH says..... im not lying either............... 7.5!!! I have really high co2 in my house, if I do the fresh air test (take a cup of your water outside for 1hr with an airstone and recheck your pH you will be supprised) and my pH usually goes up by at least .4-.7

to stir or not, well if your using a kalk reactor you need to stir it from time to time, but if your only mixing batch by batch, then do as the others are doing and mix once, wait and dose all but the bottom inch. I let it settle in a gallon jug, pour out all but 1 inch, then in my doser jug, the air line doen't go all the way to the bottom, so It doesn't dose anything that may have settled there (plus my kalk goes through a filter too) But its not the end of the world if some kalk precip gets into your tank it won't do any harm, but we usually take the extra precautions and not let it.

the less the mixed kalk water is moved, the less time it has exposed to air, the longer it stays fresh. My kalk container has a lid on it.

How much kalk did you add to your ATO tank?
how many gallons is it?
did you leave the pump in there?
Whats was your daily useage of Ca and Alk?
What did you use to raise each?

sorry for all the Qs but we can get this figured out!

some of my fav kalk tips....

using the reef calculator fully saturated lime has 2 tsp/g and unsaturated lime is 1 tsp/g

2 tsp kalk/g will raise the pH .6, Alk 25ppm (1.4 dKH), and Ca 10ppm if 1.25% of the total tank volume is exchanged.

another words, If I dosed 1/2g of fully saturated kalk in my 40g system from evaporation.
 
My ATO reservoir is 10g. The kalk bottle said to add 1/8tsp-2tsp per gallon. Since this is my first try with kalk I did 5tsp to the tank. I ran the pump for about 45min after adding it - and I added it straight to the reservoir - I didn't mix it first and dump the mix in.

My calcium is the big thing I'm trying to take care of with the kalk. When I set up the tank my calcium was hanging tight at around 500 for the first couple of weeks. Last week it went to 400 - last night it was 250.

I hadn't been doing anything for the calcium (figure the kalk will take care of that) and was using Seachem's Reef Carbonate for alkalinity.
 
And the 10g full of lime water is still cloudy? Mine gets clear within an hr! and I use Mrs. wage pickling lime.

Kalk is great for maintaining your levels once they are in check, but it is not good for raising or when the two are not in balance, since its a 2 in one (not a 2 part) balanced supplement.

You are going to have to dose calcium alone and get it in check first, before you can go to straight kalk dosing, for now, dose the ATO you made, and keep that up, while using this calculator figure out how much of your Ca supp you need to get the ppm from 250 to 400 (make sure you put it into Gallons)
http://home.comcast.net/~jdieck1/chem_calc3.html

Heres a my favorite artical on what to get your levels at (worry only about the first box)
http://www.reefkeeping.com/issues/2004-05/rhf/index.htm

Good Luck!
 
When I set up the tank I used Reef Crystals. Since then I've been using Seachem. Mixing to 1.023 on my refractometer.

Jut got home from work. The precipitate has settled in the ATO reservoir but the water is still "milky" - is that normal? How clear is the upper water supposed to be? I don't see an oil/water type of difference - it's just milky water with white powder at the bottom. Is that what I'm looking for? Do you think I'm good to turn the ATO pump back on?
 
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