Water chemistry

[StirCrazy]

Originally Posted by Trigger

I am new to the salt hobby and I have a 150g reef aquarium, my current chemistry is:
Calcium 420
Magnesium 1170
Salinity 1.024
pH 7.98
Alkalinity 15.4

I was told by a lfs I had to raise my ph, so they told me to add seachem buffer. Which I did with water top offs and tank changes, and my ph stayed between 8.1 -8.3. But a friend said I should check my other levels and everything had dropped, cal 400, mag 1155 and my alk was through the roof 16 +. So I've stopped adding buffer and just add some calcium and mag, but my alk isn't coming down. Is this a problem? How do you get alk down? Should I be worried? Thanks for your help/advice.

alk is a little high, I used to run mine about 13. I would increase your Mg to about 1350. this will rais your Ca which in theory should depress your alk a bit. if your ph is constant I wouldn't worry to much about it. as for salinity, don't play with that till alk and ca are in control, I prefer a 1.025 or 1.026 for salinity but there is nothing wrong with yours.

Steve

[Drock169]

I wouldnt add chemicals unless you know what they do, not trying to be offensive. Pretty much dont add any product unless you understand the product i guess is what i'm trying to say. Buffer affect alk directly. Dont worry about your pH, there is so much concern over pH in this hobby. If your pH is something like 7.8 in the morning and 8 or 8.1 just after the lights go out, its fine. There are a lot of products out there that people will try to sell you on, about 90% you wont need, and of the remaining 10%, if depends on the type of aquarium you plan on keeping, fish only or reef, and if its a reef, is it soft corals, LPS or SPS. If its softies then for a large majority of them dont worry about Ca, Alk, and Mg.

[StirCrazy]

Originally Posted by Drock169

, if depends on the type of aquarium you plan on keeping, fish only or reef, and if its a reef, is it soft corals, LPS or SPS. If its softies then for a large majority of them dont worry about Ca, Alk, and Mg.

what softies don't deserve good water?

no matter what kind of corals you have water conditions should be as good as you can get them. I agree you don't need a lot of different crap and I said you PH was fine, but Mg is low, and it will continue to drop and you will eventualy have a Ca crash because of it. Salts are natorious for haveing to low of a Mg level as it is a way they can save money. the only thing I would do now is raise you Mg and see what the rest of the things do.

Steve