Alkalinity too high

dareefguy · #1 03-01-2008, 05:28 AM

I add kalk to maintain my calcium but It say's in order to maintane your alk you should use a alk buffer. I have not added any alk buffer but could my kent kalk be raising my alk aswell?

dareefguy · #2 03-01-2008, 05:31 AM

so should I try to get it down to at least 13 ( the max I think). If so how?

Delphinus · #3 03-01-2008, 05:32 AM

Yep, kalk does add alk as well. I would discontinue the kalk until the alk has dropped. Probably wouldn't hurt to do a water change .. whatever you do, go slow as massive alk swings are harsh on the tank inhabitants..

dareefguy · #4 03-01-2008, 05:40 AM

I just got a calcium reactor going. Only running with crushed coral at the moment. Should I discontinue the use of this aswell? I was told to use kalk at the same time as the reactor to keep my ph up.

Or would the reactor raise alk aswell? something to do with the co2 maybe?

mark · #5 03-01-2008, 06:03 AM

If you read about Ca reactors you'll probably come across them being called alk reactors as well. They definitely will raise the alk levels.

Understand the reasoning for adding kalk for pH using a reactor, but were you having problems with pH? I run a reactor, not using kalk and pH stays around 8.2-8.3.

untamed · #6 03-01-2008, 07:44 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by dareefguy

I just got a calcium reactor going. Only running with crushed coral at the moment. Should I discontinue the use of this aswell? I was told to use kalk at the same time as the reactor to keep my ph up.

Or would the reactor raise alk aswell? something to do with the co2 maybe?

People do use both for certain reasons, but that is the last thing you should be thinking about...The bottom line is that BOTH methods supply BOTH Ca and Alk and both have to be carefully controlled. The idea is to replace ONLY the Ca and Alk that are being used up by the tank and no more than that.

Between your two methods, you are oversupplying your tank with Ca and Alk. You need to stop both and get let those levels fall back to normal before carefully restarting in a controlled way. Don't venture to use both methods until you have a much better understanding of how it all works.

...and don't worry about what pH your tank is...