sudden drop in kh

screwsloose

screwsloose

New member
i have had my tank running for a while with no problems. alkalinity was always around a steady 8 dkh and calcium ranges between 350-400 . i started dosing with b-ionic two part last week. followed the instructions and dosed per the recommended levels on weds,thurs, and friday. did not dose saturday and did my water change on sunday. yesterday i noticed all my star pollops closed and half the zoos as well. tested and my alkalinity is now registering lower then 1 dkh. can any one tell me why this drop off ishappening?
 
Is calcium high? You have to be careful with dosing I recommend going slow and maybe adding a little less then the recommended amount at first. check the levels daily until you get it dialed in on how much calcium and alk that you need to be adding based on what is soaked up by the corals.
 
calcium is running between 350-400 depending. mainly have softies. the hard coral i have is a candy cane. and a plate coral but cannot remember the name of it. so start dosing lower numbers slowly to raise it back up?
 
you said you were dosing per the directions... what does that mean exactly? Sometimes that means kind of blindly adding a determined about based on tank volume, or it can mean measuring your levels, determining daily drop, and calculating the precise amount to make up the used up alk.

anyways, I'd suspect you either had precipitate fall out of suspension (though that should have been visible with a cloudy tank) or you have a bad test. did you try to repeat it?
 
i have not tested for magnesium yet.

per the directions are adding an ounce of alkalinity mix per 100 gls per day. i have a 250 gl system so i added 2 ounces.

tank is perfectly clear. not the slightest bit of cloudiness. is it possible i am mixing too fast? should i try a drip system instead? the directions call for pouring it into the tank in the fastest moving flow area.
 
yesterday i noticed all my star pollops closed and half the zoos as well. tested and my alkalinity is now registering lower then 1 dkh. can any one tell me why this drop off ishappening?

I expect that value is testing error. Alkalinity cannot drop this low without you adding absurdly large amounts of a calcium supplement or a strong acid like muriatic acid from a hardware store.
 
i have tested with two different kh test kits and got the same results with both. one is 8 months old and the other is 2 months old. i will retest to confirm this.

what should i do to counter this ? wait for it to balance and hope for the best?
 
I just can't see how this is possible. Is there ANYTHING you have changed within the past week, excluding the water change? I always drip anything that changes alk & calcium. I use the very same stuff at the LFS, and I find that I usually have to do a higher dose to raise alk & calcium. What are you using to test alkalinity? What else do you add to the tank? What kind of water for top-off?
 
no new additions recently. added a candy cane frag two weeks ago but it only has two heads so shouldnt make a difference.

i am testing with an api reef master test kit. and i have aslo bought another kh test kit for the gh part as well.

the only additives other then sea chems prime is the new stuff. its called b-ionic made by esv

i manually top of my water right now.. in the process of building an auto top off system but havent got it going yet.
 
I would just leave it alone for now... do you have any stony corals in there that are high demands on alk/calc? if not, there's no rush to increase it, let it alone a couple more days or even a week and then start raising it a bit at a time. Determine how much volume/weight of the b-ionic is needed to raise the alk by a determined dkh, and go from there. Don't just dump stuff in without knowing how much it's going to raise the level in your tank.
 
When you did the water change did you mix water with salt or salt with water? ..... How do you make your water? If you put the salt in the container first and pour water into it you can seriously screw up the chemistry of the water, expecially if you don't mix it up quickly or don't add enough water at first. Hope somebody tracks down the issue. Best of luck!
 
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what should i do to counter this ? wait for it to balance and hope for the best?

Do not do anything yet. It is almost certainly not correct. You will be more likely to create a problem rather than solve one.

Can you describe what kit, how you are using it, how much fluid you added before the color change, what salt mix you are using, the salinity, etc?
 
my salt is mixed in an extra 125 gl tank. water added and dechlorinated. then add salt(REEF CRYSTALS FROM INSTANT OCEAN) at 2 cups per 30 minutes until salinity is matched to the dt. then it sets over night being aerated. pumped into the tank the next day via quite one 3000.

test kit is an api kh test kit. add 5 ml of aquarium water into the vial. when i put the first drop in and place the cap on and turn it over a couple of times it turns pale blue which according to the directions is below 1 dkh. any other time its yellow until i add at least 8 drops inverting after every drop.

i am considering just doing another large water change. would this be recommended?
 
a water change won't hurt, but I'd recommend getting another test kit to check the api against. I'd suggest another titration kit, such as the salifert.
 
Try testing the new salt mix water in exactly the same way and see what you get. Make certain the vial is washed totally clean before using it.
 
will do both tonight when i get home. and will try to get a new test kit today of another brand. i have two api's and both are showing the same readings. everything is testing right on my qt tank though. its all odd
 
I know that the API kit should be blue until you get the right readings on KH, then it should turn yellow. That is how mine works at the LFS. I think you may be reading the instructions wrong. On mine it says "...After the first drop is added, the solution will turn pale blue. If the water sample contains 1 Dkh or less, the solution will turn pale yellow after the first drop is added..."

Try adding drops until it turns pale yellow and report back, I fear your Kh might be too high, and that is a bad situation...
 
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