Purple Up vs. Kent Marine Concentrated Calcium

[DetectiveTofu]

Is there a benefit to dosing Kent Marine Concentrated Calcium verus Purple up to aid in coralline growth?

I know if you OD on just calcium, in the long run your alk will be whacky. But since purple up has calcium, and magnesium, and strontium (and other things I am sure) will this help to keep alk in check?

 

[northbay-reefer]

This is a loaded question you have to keep in mind that calcium, magnesium and alk have a relationship you dont want to have too much of one thing and too little of the others, the 3 have to be within a balance or precipitation will occur. The best place to get this information is in the chemistry forum, Randy has it explained very well. He also have a chart that you can use to keep those 3 things in balance of one another. Once you can maintain a balanced level, your corals will loveeeeeeeeee you

 

[stubbsz]

Most are using commercial 2 Part solutions to balance them (C-Balance, B-Ionic and some Kent thing I think are the ones I've heard of). Some of us are using Randy's recipes to balance them for a fraction of the price (getting the ingredients can be a pain though)

http://www.reefkeeping.com/issues/2006-02/rhf/index.php

 

[jedininja]

Plus are you testing for any of those substances? I would never dose anything in my tank unless I knew what my levels were at and where they will be after dosing.

 

[sfsuphysics]

IIRC... purple up was a sugar based calcium, which means it's absolutely useless for coral growth, however coraline growth will work wonders since it's all that will use it.

However if you keep your tank at a particular level, it shouldn't matter what product you use. I think Seachem also makes a sugar based calcium mixture as well.

 

[DetectiveTofu]

I do test my water yes.