What salt is everybody using lately.. for close to NSW SPS / ULNS tanks? I give up..

MammothReefer

MammothReefer

Active member
What is with everybody changing there formulas. I took a couple years off from reefing, setup a tank about a year and a half ago.. I've been shooting for

8-9 DKH
380-420 Calc
and 1350-1400 Mag..

Good ole IO which used to have a decent low level alk is now mixing up @ 11.28 @ 1.024 (I run my tank @ 1.025 so I'm guessing it will be a bit more when I'm done) This has been mixing for 24 hours, and was tested with both a hanna checker, and a salifer kit both results were the same.

Red Sea Coral Pro which used to have an ALK of 7.5 is now claiming mixing @ 12.2, but the box I got was almost 16dkh.

I just bought 2x200 Gallons of IO.. only to have them mix up @ 11.5., Reef Crystals supposedly is mixing @ 13?!!?!

What does that leave me with TMCP?!, D + D + $$$$, Tunze $$$, or HW which is also $$$..

So many of us run our dkh in the 8-9 range.. I'm tired of fighting of my alk.. I'm tempting to just having my parameters match my salt vs trying to find a salt to match the parameters I want. I'm just afraid of the fallout.. Every-time My alk gets anywhere near the 10 range.. Things die. Just this week my alk went from 8.5-9.3 over the course of 3 days and 2 frags rtn'd. I can't see my tank working @ 11-11.5 at least with not some serious losses in the process.
 
KZ Reefers Best Salt; the parms have always been spot on --- going on 3yrs. now with RBS

dKH 7.5-7.8 [Hanna]
Ca 410 [Elos],
Mg 1200-1250 [Elos],
K+ 380ppm [KZ]
@ 53.0 mS [American Marine Pinpoint Salinity Monitor]
 
According to the salt test thread, everything is spot on minus the alk which they got 11 and KZ = $$$$$$$ compared to all other salts.


TheHun said:
KZ Reefers Best Salt; the parms have always been spot on --- going on 3yrs. now with RBS

dKH 7.5-7.8 [Hanna]
Ca 410 [Elos],
Mg 1200-1250 [Elos],
K+ 380ppm [KZ]
@ 53.0 mS [American Marine Pinpoint Salinity Monitor]
Click to expand...
 
MammothReefer said:
According to the salt test thread, everything is spot on minus the alk which they got 11 and KZ = $$$$$$$ compared to all other salts.
Click to expand...


I personally never got this high number (above 7.8)... RBS working for me, maybe not for others. I guess you get what you pay for...
 
allsps40 said:
I am not running a ULNS but I am using RSCP with good results. Think Im going to normal Red Sea.
Click to expand...

I had high hopes for RSCP, but I got a bad box or something.. Alk of 16. I was really behind in my water changes (box showed up late for some weird reason), and didn't test before doing my water change.. I lost a few pieces :(

Won't ever do that again.
 
What about ESV 4-part?? It's a little rich, but I've been pleased with it. I'm getting consistent alk readings of 9 dKh +/- .3 with Ca @ 440 and Mag at 1450 with sg of 1.025.
 
I'm giving up, I've come to realize something I never noticed or if I did, I didn't put 2 and 2 together, or just didn't want to admit to myself what I noticed because in my head this whole time I've told myself I should be running @ 8-9 DKH. I had great results with my tank running @ 8-9 DKH, however that was 8-9 DKH with an elos test kit. Then in May I ran into an issue with Elos kits, and switched to Salifert/Hanna which matched each other but were 2 Points higher then my elos kits were. My 9.5 on an elos ran as 11.5 for my salifert. I was nervous about running @ 10-11, so I figured I would shoot for the middle and go for 9 with a salifert. Hoping it would put me middle of the road w/a test kit that ran to high, and a one that ran to low.. Now I'm just going to cave, my tank isn't doing bad, but it's not doing great I've lost a few pieces due to swings, and I've always felt I'd rather have a stable number then a perfect number.. So now I'm just going to shoot for IO specs I'm tired of chasing numbers that don't match my water change levels. I want to be able to a 50% water change if I need to and know my specs won't swing. So if that means I'm running my tank @ 11 on a hanna, that would be the same as running my tank on elos @ 9... which did just fine.

I've started the process to slowly raise my alk, wish me luck.. I'm sure I'll get some rescission at first but hopefully I won't loose anything more then I already have.
 
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The esv is nice if you don't mind mixing the different parts.

I've been using good old tropic marin regular going on 3 years now. I tried the esv for a while. I liked it, but didn't see any improvement with all of the added work so I went back to good old TM. I never got a bad bucket. I was buying the 50 gal mixes, have gone through about 4 buckets and now I'm thinking of going back. My batches were more consistant with the smaller packages.
 
I would say you should be fine, when I started keeping sps I remember being told to shoot for keeping alk at 12dkh. I think you'll be fine at 11 if you can keep it stable. IMO keeping it stable is paramount to success!
 
Ya, I used to run it that high for a while then when I started vodka dosing on my old system I was running hw and alk at around 8-9 it worked amazing. I started off doing the same on this system, but with the elos kit and biopellets that worked great as well..
I was doing really well with it lower and even took of the pellets and still had great results.. but I don't know ever since I started using that bucket of RSCP things started receding, or RTN'ing. I thought maybe it was just the alk so I tried turning off my dosers, and just making up for my depleted alk with small daily water changes but that made things worse. I lost a few new pieces and a couple pieces I've had for over a year started to recede as well. I'm having a hard time not just doing the entire 40gallons I mixed as I really won't to saturate out any bits of that RSCP from my system, re-adjust my targets and treat my system like it's a new tank again. Everything else is great level wise just alk has been a thorn in my side all summer long.
 
How much water are you changing at once for it to throw you off? I run my alk at 8 with RC and as long as I do small water changes it doesn't really budge all that much.
 
aquaph8 said:
How much water are you changing at once for it to throw you off? I run my alk at 8 with RC and as long as I do small water changes it doesn't really budge all that much.
Click to expand...

I try to do 10-15 gallons a week on my 65+15 frag+ 40 sump. I've never measured to figure out what my total water volume is but I'm guessing I'm doing about 10% a week or so. RC is supposed to have an alk of 13.. You'd have to be doing really small water changes not to bump @ all from 8?
 
I do about 25 gallons biweekly on my 225 with little change. It raises it a little but not enough to worry about.
 
I just tested, I raised my alk by .2 via a 15 gallon change.. so if I do 15 gallons every other day or so I should be able to slowly raise it up to 11.

With that said, ya I can probably setup my dosers to account for the .2 raise I would get from my weekly water change., and keep my alk lower however the lower I go the bigger the swing (currently my alk is @ 9.5, up from 9.3) If I had it @ 8 it would have been a bigger swing.. and secondly in the event I need to do a large water change which unfortunately is something that happens from time to time. (When in doubt.. do a water change!) Not having my params match my salt brand is just problem-matic. Perfect example few weeks ago my tank flooded when I was out of town (not much but enough) I had to make up a batch of what I had, and it ended up spiking my alk almost 2 points..I burnt a lot of tips >_< I want my tank to be a simple as possible.. need to do a big water change because of some freak accident.. I don't want to have to worry about parameter swings. Maybe my philosophy will change over time but for the next 6months or so this is my new mantra.. ha.
 
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Youre not alone. I bought a bucket of rscp over the summer and boy ill never do that again. Thankfully I tested the water before doing a wc. Rediculous that they could have an alk that high. I dont even understand how that is possible. Needless to say, the chalk white mixing brute tipped me off thankfully!
 
Thats what I did after getting that crazy bucket of rscp. I just gave up and went to IO and let my parameters fall and rise to where they wanted to be and things are on the right track and stable now. I just dont think you can beat IO. I do have to hand dose calcium once a week on top of my two part in order to keep it above 400 and alk at 8.3, but the alk is rock steady. Ive thought my kit was broke severa; times due to getting the same number so many times in a row. But when I test my new water it tests at 10.

THis works for me.
 
I'm still sticking with the Reef Crystals. It's not perfect, but what is?

chrishayes said:
Thats what I did after getting that crazy bucket of rscp. I just gave up and went to IO and let my parameters fall and rise to where they wanted to be and things are on the right track and stable now. I just dont think you can beat IO. I do have to hand dose calcium once a week on top of my two part in order to keep it above 400 and alk at 8.3, but the alk is rock steady. Ive thought my kit was broke severa; times due to getting the same number so many times in a row. But when I test my new water it tests at 10.

THis works for me.
Click to expand...

How often/much do you water change? I figured IO mixed a lower alk than IO Reef Crystals, but not sure of the difference.
 
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