Are we all ready?
Are we all ready?
Ok. My mind is odd, if you hadn't noticed. Sometimes some single thing someone says doesn't completely register at the moment, but at some point in the future, it may. If it does, it is usually riding the coat-tails of "idea" - sometimes these ideas pan out, sometimes they do not, but I wanted to share with you and see what the group consensus is.
'DOG - your first assignment, should you choose to accept it, is to verify and clarify this post, lol. As the person going for the degree, you get to be the fact checker, and keep me honest, and help me where I stumble. Ok?
I will list the particular postings that helped me hatch my idea's. I will leave out the names to protect anything needing protecting
Again, I will say that I didn't come up with all of this on my own; my genetics buddy has helped me come up with the questions and then the answers...
Here goes.
you are using this rock as a filter and you think ti wont absorb calcium?
Unless we interrupt that process, the calcium in the rock is going to absorb the water of hydration if it can, something it does better in air and humidity.
Ion-rich saltwater will allow calcium to slowly leach out as room becomes available for it in bulk water. Providing the surface is etched (PH stabilized), you shouldn't have a significant PH increase with this slow leach.
I only have an elevated ALK - Calcium is still a bugger to raise and maintain.
calcium hydroxide, known as hydrated lime or quick lime in the construction trade, will speed the setting & curing time of cement.
Ok - this is a representation of regular Portland cement. Clinker is the powder, before water is added to start hydration. Cement is just that - the makeup of the hydrated cement - cement that has completed it's hydration.
Clinker Mass%
Tricalcium silicate 3CaO SiO2 45-75%
Dicalcium silicate 2CaO SiO2 7-32%
Tricalcium aluminate 3CaO Al2O3 0-13%
Tetracalcium aluminoferrite 4CaO Al2O3 Fe2O3 0-18%
Gypsum CaSO4 2-10%
Cement Mass%
Calcium oxide, CaO 61-67%
Silicon oxide, SiO2 19-23%
Aluminium oxide, Al2O3 2.5-6%
Ferric oxide, Fe2O3 0-6%
Sulfate 0-1%
My first question is, "WHERE IS ALL THE CALCIUM?" The clinker contains almost 100% calcium based materials, however the cement has a measly 67%? ***?
I think cement uses the missing calcium up in the chemical process of becoming cured cement. This is especially true based on the Calcium Chloride remark, which I googled, and holds up.
If this is the case, then calcium is a vital element. Now say that hydration is not complete, but the pH is 8-9, so we throw it in and use it.
We know it raises ALK, but that is ok. But the higher the ALK, the harder it is to get calcium into solution. Which is shown by my Biocube - I can't get CA up to 400, and have trouble maintaining 380ppm. Based on the chemistry I've read, if one is high, the other will become proportionately harder to raise.
'Dog, can you verify this for us?
Ok, so. What if the CA I am dosing
is going to the cement matrix? Think about it from an atomic level. Calcium is being used to hydrate, but if that process is interrupted (KURING), and we flush away the "excess" Ca(OH)2, then hydration is paused
until another source of calcium is supplied, i.e. Calcium Chloride from dosing/saltwater.
I think what is happening is the calcium is indeed being pulled from the water by the rock, and those calcium ions are fitting into the "sockets" that the "excess" we flushed away was
supposed to fill...
Ok, if we accept this, then possibly I have a solution.
Calcium Chloride. Use it both in the rock, but also in the Kure The calcium from the chloride will be more readily available, and could fit into the ion sockets and "finish" the hydration. The added bonus would be that if the rock is pulling calcium out of the water to complete itself, this should stop that process dead.
And finally, I think that the acid "etching" (I call it a bath) doesn't actually stablize it, but instead flushed the stuff we are already flushing away with water - it is just happening faster with a weak acid bath...
I am doing a water change today, and will reserve the saltwater for an experiment.
Will Jiffy Rock that is one week old, and been acid bathed to a stable 9pH remain stable at 9pH when placed directly into saltwater? I will also run another test with Calcium Chloride in the kure water.
I will have to make a batch tonight to see - I have nothing in the works that I can use for this - bunch of bicarbonate tests going
So. Thoughts? Ideas? Flames?
erlite) - the sand was blaster sand, so not Ca based.
