Tony, now that you're singling out a sex, do you have an idea of whom said this "famous" quote? :?:

jeana all reef need calcium and carbonate no matter wath you keep in it
the only difference is the amount to add but those are the basic two that all reef need first

Duh! I was thinking of the other thread, the Calcium Reactor & Kalk one, when I wrote this post.... Sorry. :oops:

:lol: :lol: :lol: confusing hein!

well your wrong.. that will teach you for having a opinion :wink:

the only things I didn't monitor was Mg as I didn;t have a Mg test kit untill I started suspecting it as part of the problem. my PH was 8.1 steady.. same as it is now.. so that theory was no good also.

one thing I have notices sence I stoped using kalk is the growth or real fine short turf algae.. it is a maroon color and looks quite nice... still it is there..


yup I agree it is cheep and they use something else to balance there alkalinity, a Ca reactor maintains the alkalinity and other desolved minerals in a tank and at the same time provides a good enuf level of Ca. in my opinion using both is the best way to go.

Delphinus, Unless Darren used to be a girl, then no it was a guy :wink:

it was Darren that said it to me when I was concidering using dolomite for a substrate.. and I am now glad I took that bit of advice and threw the dolomite on the Lawn.. whare it belongs and not in my tank.

Steve

[quote="StirCrazy"]Steve kalk to both in balance I do it for 2-3 years and never break the balance read that link http://www.advancedaquarist.com/issues/nov2002/chem.htm

I dont dose anyting more than kalk, vinegar,and food the only additive that go in my reef that it that all :D see the result http://www.canreef.com/phpBB2/viewtopic.php?t=3683
I dont do any test of magnesium and only do my water change each month

I dose 3.5 gallon a day of the most saturate kalk 365 day a years and dont ever have any magnesium précipitation and a lot of people I know do it and never ger any problem :wink:

if you break the balance you did someting rong or use bad lime or wath ever I dont know. have you buy that cheap pic lime from Mr wagie? wath kind of lime you were using?

vinegar... instead of CO2?

yes it help expand the quantity of kalk you use lower the PH of the solution when I forget to refil the reactor for two day the calcium and alk get to low so I do a mixture of 30 ml of vinergar in on teaspoon of kalk mix it in a glass and put that ting in the tank

Dont do it at home until you realy know what you doing

Stephane, the biggest problem, and what I think mine was, comes from dosing kalk by evaperation make up and not having enuf of a calcium demand in your tank.. ie.. dosing kalk throught make up water on new tanks..

I have no fear that I could go back to Kalk now with no problems as the calcium demand in my tank is much larger than what it was back then.

did you dose Kalk in the first 3 to 5 months of your tank being up?

Oh Stephane.. also how big is your kalk reactor?

Steve

I have setup that tank ten years ago :D I have move it several time and even upgrade the tank from a 5 foot to a 6 but never restart the tank

maybe a real new tank dont react the same on PH as I have not realy experiment on new tank and calcium should be monitor beter but IMO
it is not a good id to dose any supplement on a new tank cause it take IMO more than 3-5 month to set up a reef and add coral to be safe and they dont realy grow fast at first

in a new reef PH never go down realy as well as calcium so addition should only begin when ph go down IMO and strart realy slowly
cause it is very easy to overdose

a new reef should last 1 years at lest on a kilos of kalk I dose it in 2 month