I would hope that a decent Kalk reactor in addition to dosing would balance that out a little. How much top off do you go through in a day?

Not that much actually and the amount has been dropping as overall temperatures have been rising. I'd say about 5-10g/day. In the beginning it was closer to 10g, now I'd say more like 4.5-6g depending on how dry the weather is.

This daily mixing up of BRS 2-part sucks. The products are great, my tank is just too big for the 1g jugs.

So I guess my question, before I buy bigger dosing containters, is can I make my additives more concentrated? I don't see why not, but hey, its Monday! Aside from the obvious cautions of dose into a high-flow area, and don't dose too quickly, etc. anyone see any downsides to mixing up my addives in more concentrated batches?

And cause everyone likes photos, here are some shots of the new in-stair lighting. Now you don't have to turn on the overhead lighting to go upstairs and down. I like it, it means less light disptions while watching television, gaming or enjoying the tank.

http://i21.photobucket.com/albums/b2...ps7b68da47.jpg

Playing with my phone.
http://i21.photobucket.com/albums/b2...ps5641139b.jpg

I have to profess I am sort of confused that your consumption rates seem to be so high at this point. Given my understanding on how the world works, I would expect that the initial dosing would be based on the gap between your target levels and and the leves of your salt mix, which, given the larger tank volume, would make sense that it may require an excessive initial dosing .. but once there, I would have expected that the nominal or day to day dosing would be based on replacing that which is consumed by coral growth and coraline and so on. Ie., it should taper off and then gradually increase to match the growth (ie. as corals get bigger, there is more corals to take more Ca and Alk, and stuff..). To be dumping in >1gallon of Can and Alk dosing per day just seems very surprising. Unless you have way more corals than I think you do .. maybe I need to look at them pictures again! :redface:

As far as making your dosing batches more concentrated ... I don't see a problem with this unless you are already near or at the saturation point.

To give you an example, on my 280g (which I thought until now was reasonably hungry for Ca and Alk), I make up 1 gallon of Ca and 1 gallon of soda ash using 2 cups of each to 1 gallon. This is pretty close to the saturation point for the Alk in particular. It takes a long time to mix into solution (to the point I just have a powerhead mixing it all the time). However if I leave the lid off just a little askew, that little bit of evaporation that happens is enough to supersaturate the solution within a few days and it then flash freezes (or whatever the term is to cause a dissolved solution to precipitate out en masse, it's been too long for me since my chem courses so I don't remember. Plus, I kind of have a mental block because organic chem pretty much destroyed me as a human being. Stupid Chem350...). Anyhow. It's kind of neat because it looks like ice crystals but the whole bucket will be in this state and I pretty much have to dump it and mix anew at that point. So I don't think one would get much more than 2 cups of soda ash into 1 gallon.

As an aside, I'm using Eli's soda ash and calcium chloride, maybe that stuff is more concentrated than the BRS stuff. I dunno, I just find it too cost prohibitive and inconvenient to order from BRS when Eli is right here in the city, so I based that choice on convenience rather than how much I appeared to be dosing.

Also as an aside that 1 gallon of solution, assuming no weird flash freeze events, lasts me about 2 weeks. I dose 3 times per day of each using cycles in the 45 minute mark and using 1.1ml/min and 1.0ml/min dosing pumps so I guess I could probably do a better job of estimating how often I replace but it's longer than one week. I could not imagine having to mix the stuff daily, there's no way I would tolerate that myself more than a couple days before completely losing patience with that..

You're right. I overcame the hump of bringing everything into line about 2 weeks before I started dosing. I think I'd have to go back and really look to be sure though.

I think my fluctuations/usage are little parts of a few things; a) water changes, b) coraline, c) top off water, and very minorly d) corals/clam.

I've been tracking things pretty hardcore in regards to water changes and I've noticed that topping off over the course of a week brings up my dKH, and lowers my Mg. However water changes lower my dKH and raise my Mg.

I think most of the Ca and dKH in the system right now is going to coraline growth. Its starting to take off, and I think I'm starting to see a similar increase in uptake, but I only have a small data sample to guess with. Ca has the largest daily uptake by far, with Mg being next, and dKH being last.

I'm switching to Eli's products when I next need to refill my supplies. I agree the cost of BRS shipping makes it nearly prohibitive to dose their products. I have repeatedly heard and seen first hand that there is a quality (purity?) difference and it shows with Eli's stuff.

I've been following Hugo's SPS Tank (xjoyhugo1980) on Reef Central for a little while. Specifically I found his tank through research on additives. Given that I have a firm monthly budget for the tank I'm always looking for ways to reduce my carrying costs. Hugo uses diluted honey as a carbon/AA source.

A quote from another thread related to honey dosing;
BTW, addition of iodine and dilute honey (yes, those produced by bees) soluion is found to be helpful and efficient on maintaining the color. Sufficient amino acids which are the basic sources to build up a protein canbe found in honey. You can try to add to see if this method works!



Honey, which is rich in either sugar and amino acids, can be used as carbon source and protein synthesis source. For carbon source, might act as Vodka, should be helpful in removing nitrate and phosphate. As for the protein synthesis source, amino acids are essential compositions of proteins. Since the colors of the corals are lights emitted from the fluorecent proteins in the corals, providing sufficient amino acids should be efficient for the protein synthesis. The more the fluorecent proteins inside the corals, the intenser the color of the corals.

This is suggested and tested by myself. Any question or comment are welcome to discuss here!

Before dosing, I usually dilute the honey in fresh water in the ratio of 1:100 (honey/water). With the dilute solution prepared, 1 ml soultion is dosed per 25 gal (~100 liter). No negatives are observed to date. I start to dose honey since two years ago. Should be feasible to reef tanks. You can try this method with half the dosing amount in the beginning.


I'm gearing up to do my first replacement dosing chemical order for Tibet. I see a lot of 5g buckets in my future.

I keep meaning to ask you if you still have the three amigos I gave you a couple years ago?

The clams or the fish?

May FTS. I dosed coral snow, then had an unplanned couch nap and woke up to all these pretty colours.

http://i21.photobucket.com/albums/b2...ps4d547736.jpg

And I thought disco was dead:razz:


The fish..... Regal, yellow and naso

They're all at a friend's place in the south. I rehomed them last summer with the understanding that it was to be temporary, however Dory, Sunshine (the yellow) and Heyou (the Naso) have been adopted by a child who is rather attached to them. Heyou can eat an entire nori sheet to himself in about 2 minutes he is THAT much of an eater.

good to hear that they are all still alive and kickin

Where dem purps cathrine?:mrgreen:

In my tank eating all my algae! The big one is the docile one and the small one is "King of the Tank". Between my four tangs (yellow, blue eye bristletooth and 2 purples) they've eaten pretty much all the algae visible in the below photos.

http://i21.photobucket.com/albums/b2...ps7e448034.jpg


End shot from earlier this month;
http://i21.photobucket.com/albums/b2...ps2670ee6f.jpg


Utility bill this month. You can see the point in time when I turned the 4x 250w MHs on and where we started to fill things like the sump, the water change system, etc.
http://i21.photobucket.com/albums/b2...psbac60b7c.jpg


New Clam from sphelps
http://i21.photobucket.com/albums/b2...psd0421442.jpg


New other clams, adorable little maximas. They open extra wide after a dose of amino acides and look absolutely stunning when looking top down.
http://i21.photobucket.com/albums/b2...ps75b40cdc.jpg

ouch 1 yellow remains from the 9 you added? :cry:

Sadly so. I feel terrible about it too. They just vanished sometime between lights out and when I'd get home from work the next day. I do want to try more, but I'm not rushing it because I'm so nervous about it. :neutral:

I picked this pair up last week.

http://i21.photobucket.com/albums/b2...pse65bcad3.jpg


This is the female, she just started eating (voraciously) yesterday.

http://i21.photobucket.com/albums/b2...psd1434c54.jpg

They, but him mostly, spend a lot of time playing in the flow. I think she's starting to settle in though as she becomes more playful each day.

SOOOOOO Awesome! Love those triggers. I think they'll be nice and happy in that monster home :-)

Nice! Such gorgeous triggers, I love crosshatches.

Wow...I hear you also picked up the little Unicorn Tang as well? Beautiful fish,

wow, those crosshatches are gorgeous. Would love to see them swimming about in all that room they've got.

amazing looking fish! i'll bet they're going to eat you out of house and home!

I've always loved crosshatches too but could never pull the.... Um.... Trigger:mrgreen:

Sooo cheesy... but I am almost in tears laughing.. :lol:

Fish that big need names :mrgreen:

They look super happy :)

Thank you... Thank you very much *takes bow*


how bout Brad and Angela?.... Both pretty and worth a lot:wink:

Thank you!

Tiny little Vlamingi actually. He was about 1.25" in length, but I am sure he is growing, yesterday he looked closer to 1.5". He competes with the male trigger for shrimp. It's adorable. 1.5" tiny fish vs 9" fully fleshed out trigger.

They already are; the triggers eat 3-5 large uncooked shrimp EACH every day. Yesterday 2 people and 1 tank ate shrimp for dinner, it was like $20!
Must go rub the lucky pheasent ball tree for more cash.

Groan, but hilarious. I'll admit to my cheeks hurting my laughing.

:lol::mrgreen::lol:

HOLY POOP. I'd go broke!!!

I feel broke. It's turned out its a great transition food actually and now the female readily takes krill and mysis.


I think I just picked up a Fowleri tang misidentified as black spot for über cheap.

It pays to go stock up on your QT and just in case medications sometimes!

http://i21.photobucket.com/albums/b2...psb1995e90.jpg

http://i21.photobucket.com/albums/b2...ps4c0f72a7.jpg

And in a completely unrelated purchase I bought a AI Sol LED fixture to try out.

Nice score, here is mine right now, colours are starting to show, you'll love him.

http://i617.photobucket.com/albums/t...ps2a4ecb73.jpg

The colours look great!

Here is the King. He and his missus need some proper names.
http://i21.photobucket.com/albums/b2...psed61e75a.jpg

I unfortunately have to report that neither the male or the female crosshatch made it. They both died within 24 hours of each other.

And then the Speedway DC pump on my 4-way Ocean Motions that runs the full 10.5ft of the tank died. Then there was the flooding...and then the water bans.

I have quite the cyano outbreak from rationing my water changes, pretty much I had to judge; water change with a limited supply of RO/DI given the emergency situation or not. I chose not to and the cyano got ahead of me. Bad choice, but it was the right choice at the time given I had no idea how long I'd have to top off from my reserve.

Here you can see the good stuff happening in my tank; clam growth and lots of it. This photo is nearly 3 weeks old already. The growth is wonderful. I just keep focusing on enjoying what I do have; happy fish, growing clams and SPS with no RTN or STN happening.

May 15th
http://i21.photobucket.com/albums/b2...psd0421442.jpg

Late June
http://i21.photobucket.com/albums/b2...ps9153a88a.jpg

I'm glad you have at least some good news. Really unfortunate about the cross hatch pair though. Damn!

So sorry to hear a out the triggers, I always take a fish loss very personal even those times when it's out of our control :-( (I just lost a fish out of my own stupidity (uncovered pump intake), still mad at myself)

Any warning on the SpeedWave failure or did it just stop? I've heard of a few failures on RC as well, wondering if there is a common problem? I was thinking of getting a couple of the Waveline 12000 or 20000 (if they ever release them) not so sure now.

Francis

No warning, just died while I was sitting nearby the tank. Its unfortunate because I actually like the pump, however when I replace it it'll be going on a different 4-way return.

Sorry to hear about the cross hatches :-( they were beautiful fish.

Sorry to hear about the triggers :sad: Glad the rest of the tank is ok though.

FTS for July 2013
http://i21.photobucket.com/albums/b2...ps087297e2.jpg

Ugh, saw an unhappy small maxima this afternoon and picked it up, and these were on it.

http://i21.photobucket.com/albums/b2...ps8c033623.jpg

I removed these two and inspected the other 6 clams, these were the only ones found. Image search agrees they seem to be pyramid snails. My bad luck run agrees, its probably another nasty annoying thing to deal with. Today I somewhat dislike this hobby. So all I haven't hit on is flood or fire. Please please please don't let it be either of those next.

Video of the tank.