What to purchase next???

No. But it's $9 for a massive amount, and for the most part you just dump it in the water. I mix mine with vinegar first but that's it. I currently don't have enough coral to justify a dosing system as the kalk and waterchanges keep my calcium over 400 and I dose a very very small amount of mag like once every week or two. Doing this over the last two months I've seen more growth than I had over the previous six plus months of just doing waterchanges. I think the brs starter kit setup is like $55 and comes with a metric **** ton of dosing stuff.
 
Good call on the ato. Now get some kalkwasser and dump it in.

Kalk in your res is not accurate due to your evaporation rate fluctuating. Unless your in a climate controlled house and it's 70 degrees through out the year then it's great. Thats what I got from a member on here that switched to two part. Made sense.
 
True. Some weeks my calcium might hit as low as 390 between waterchanges while most times it doesn't go below 410... That's not enough of a drop for me to justify the cost of dosers yet. I just have gallons of two part pre mixed and poor in a few ml to get things back where I want them. Obviously a heavily stocked tank will have bigger demands so I'll have to eventually get dosers. However for the op it seems like $9 would be more in the budget and inconsistent kalk dosing through the ato will help a lot more than nothing at all.
 
Kalk in your res is not accurate due to your evaporation rate fluctuating. Unless your in a climate controlled house and it's 70 degrees through out the year then it's great. Thats what I got from a member on here that switched to two part. Made sense.

Totally agree with dragonvale It will work for a while but it can lead to issues on both sides of the fence. Too much evaporation and your pH will skyrocket and not enough evap it won't keep up. It does work well for cheap but it's Def not a permanent solution and not for everybody's tank but will probably work for him.

Another positive is its said to reduce p04 also =)..
 
Makes sense since all I did was add the kalk and my po4 dropped. It's never been what I would consider to be high but it was high enough to be easily detectable. I just chalked it up to more bacteria growth or cleaning of the sandbed or something like that.
 
So the total budget I have to work with is about 400 for upgrades. With this in mind, what add ons would one recommend? If 2 part is the way to go then I don't mind shelling out for the 2 part with dosers and an ato unit. I have RO covered. I'm also looking at another wavemaker for the upgrade eventually and considering gfo and reactor.

All of this is outside the budget for larger tank, another led fixture, and an upgraded skimmer. That will be coming from elsewhere. This 400 is strictly for upgrades to this tank that'll transfer over to my larger tank.

Thanks again for all the help
 
What's your consumption rate on the main stuff. Cal mag etc? I would spend money on quality test kits, and get the kalkwasser started kit first. Comes with the two part powders kalk etc. then later down the road once you have established your tanks needs, invest in the dosers.
 
Probably a smart idea. I'm in the process of switching to Red Sea coral pro salt too, vs nsw....so things might not need much buffering at all once I get a good amount of that salt mix in the tank.
 
Yeah it will change a lot. Without test equipment you can't even consider two part, so I'd make that investment asap.
 
Alk is typically around 7 dkh I check every couple days and add baking soda to bring up to 8-9

Calcium was tested at lfs with a crappy kit and got a result of 420

Salifert ca and alk kits on the way
 
What to purchase next???

Thanks I sure hope so. The equipment part of this vs fw is brutal to setup right. Seems like you can get away with a lot less but I don't want to restrict what coral I can keep successfully
 
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