I've re-read the instructions and it turns out I CAN mix 6g per gallon, not the 3g I've been adding so far! I'll update again soon - this should make a HUGE difference 🙂
Alex, you can force your tank to evaporate more. just put a fan over it. the fan will evaporate water and chill the tank so your heaters will also be kicking on
As an avid consumer of all major reefing channel for more than 10Y I really love your videos and true hobbies perspective! I am implementing a Kalk solution that addresses most of Kalk’s issues: I will be using a Kalk stirrer to avoid having to have a huge container that I need to fill and clean every week. Secondly, I will be feeding the stirrer with a Doser straight from the RO reservoir, so I have no need for additional containers under my sump. I have a custom RO reservoir from Pacific Sun, and it includes slots for both the RO pump tubing as well as a dosing line to connect to the doser.
Really enjoy your channel and the unabashed sincerity of your content! Thanks for taking the time to answer my question during the live stream. Definitely was not meant to be a loaded question. Instead, I am considering dosing Kalkwasser myself and just wondered how to best evaluate the early results. Can't wait to see what your medium and long-term results will reveal!
As someone mentioned during the stream, you should be able mix in 6 grams per gallon to full saturation. Per Chris Meckley 6 grams per gallon will fully dissolve if using high purity kalk. I've been mixing 6 grams per gallon and have had no settling issues. ***this is without any addition of vinegar, just pure kalk added to rodi.
I drip kalkwasser 24/7 in my 100 gallon tank. 1 gallon of kalkwasser last one day. I have like five gallon containers made up way ahead of time and they are all sealed so all I have to do is take the top off and screw that onto my dosing pump and I'm back in business I am working on finding a bigger container so I don't have to mess with swapping them out so often it's really not a big deal but it's part of the hobby great video by the way
Good point - i'll mention that in the next update - that's a good way of explaining how significant the increase I've had is so far when it might not look it on paper 🙂
Don't be afraid to use fully saturated kalkwasser solution. Just be mindful. I use fully saturated kalkwasser mixed in 25l airtight container and use dosing pump to dose it overnight. Dosing pump is connected to PH controller as a backup measure incase of any failures to avoid kalkwasser nightmarish tank killer event by kalkwasser. So,if my ph goes over 8.55 it will shut dosing pump off till it falls back. My normal pH overnight 8.2-8.3 and daytime runs up to 8.5 sometimes over averaging around 8.45. I use kalkwasser, skimmer air-intake connected to outside to pull in fresh air and I'm super happy with the PH result 🙂 Hope your kalkwasser journey will be successful. Btw, my kalkwasser 25l mix last me 50 days on average.
Well with mine, I had it connected directly to my ro unit on the wall, and using flow switch to turn the solenoids on and off each time the water level is reached. Plus I didn't add so much to the water that quickly at you did, as a sudden change in the pH is stressful. Using a float switch connected to ro unit or a pump is more accurate. So only start off with a few drips and increase the flow bit by bit, till the pH is at the right level. So they will keep the pH at a stabled level constantly if done right and follow the instructions that come, I've never had any downsides.
Early days and no icp tests as yet, but... It gave me a solid pH boost which is good. Although it crystallises more easily than Pro when it's cold so diluting it with ro is essential (in my room anyway) whereas the Pro was fine undiluted
Have to agree w/you. The Versa is "brilliant." I use mine to suck a gallon of sat. kalk from a bucket in my basement to my upstairs display tank every night... works a charm!
You should also check your trace elements given you are replacing about a third of your ATI Essentials plus (which contains a balanced amount of trace elements for a given comsumption rate) with Kalk, that contains no trace elements.
I normally relate the algae on my glass to temperature…. No matter how high or low my nutrients are the algae on glass or rocks stays the same, now if my tank temperature drops one or more degrees over a cold night I will wake up to a algae covered glass. This is my experience with 6 running tanks, but results my vary lol
Two containers, one 20ltr approx sealed lid, mix kalk in this one and leave to settle over day, once settled draw off the amount of water your tank evaporates each day into a container using the clearish solution avoiding what has settled in the bottom. Use a dosing pump connected to the container you want to dose to the tank and dose top up amount overnight, spread the dosing over the night period 15mins on 15mins off. I have used slurry but don't now as there is no way of knowing what impurities are being added, letting the kalk settle out in a sealed container will alow most of the empurities to settle out to the bottom. It's likely the ph will climb over the lighting period and depending on how much is photosynthening in the tank it will likely be a climb of around .2 . Stirers are good and ran two on a tank but it's when kalk can become dangerous if over dosed. Using kalk in a auto top up is not so good being the kalk will be added possibly too quickly when topping up, dosing pump over lights off period is far safer and slower. There's probably more to the simple method and the above is just what I do. Have a great day.
I am only on the second part of your kalk journey and I was wondering, did you have any losses due to the dosing? If so, at what period and what do you think would have prevented it? thanks in advance.
Hi Alex, Did you test the potency of the kalk coming out of the reactor ? I would have thought a permanent stirrer would keep it at its max I used a various speed rotisserie motor on my stirrer
I've just started my kalk experiment, I had always intended to do it with your plan B and am using 6g per 3.7L. Will be interesting to see your next week results as you've now doubled the amount of kalk
@@ReefDork seems too easy doesn't it. I'm doing 100ml 24x a day for now to see what happens. As for the 3.7L I googled us gallon to liters and it gave me 3.7.
Kalkwasser caused my tank some of the best growth ever but it also caused a huge crash that killed multiple expensive SPS. I am now dosing All for Reef because it's much safer IMO. Also it's easier than having to keep filling up my top off with 100% kalkwasser. The growth is not as good as with Kalkwasser but I can't complain at the same time. I am getting great Montipora growth with all for reef.
Why do you say the german word Kalkwasser and not kalkwater or something? Stupid idea: Would it be possible to add calc pouder by an feeding machine to your sump and let a flow pump mix it?
Just because that's how it's generally referred to. The English translation is lime water... No, you mustn't add the powder directly - it has to be dissolved.
Brilliant account of your kalk journey and it's role as your gateway drug to higher pH. I love that you don't gloss over the details. There's always gold in there. Would be interested to find out whether the Reef Factory top up tracks how much water is added to the tank (and therefore your kalk ceiling/fluctuation) Also...you should've known the versas would be calibrated....:-)
I've re-read the instructions and it turns out I CAN mix 6g per gallon, not the 3g I've been adding so far! I'll update again soon - this should make a HUGE difference 🙂
You can also over-saturate because there's only a certain amount that will dissolve, the rest will just remain as solid.
Alex, you can force your tank to evaporate more. just put a fan over it. the fan will evaporate water and chill the tank so your heaters will also be kicking on
As an avid consumer of all major reefing channel for more than 10Y I really love your videos and true hobbies perspective! I am implementing a Kalk solution that addresses most of Kalk’s issues: I will be using a Kalk stirrer to avoid having to have a huge container that I need to fill and clean every week. Secondly, I will be feeding the stirrer with a Doser straight from the RO reservoir, so I have no need for additional containers under my sump. I have a custom RO reservoir from Pacific Sun, and it includes slots for both the RO pump tubing as well as a dosing line to connect to the doser.
Really enjoy your channel and the unabashed sincerity of your content! Thanks for taking the time to answer my question during the live stream. Definitely was not meant to be a loaded question. Instead, I am considering dosing Kalkwasser myself and just wondered how to best evaluate the early results. Can't wait to see what your medium and long-term results will reveal!
No, it was a really good point - like it. Thanks for the question - it's that sort of contribution that helps bring out the detail 🙂
Great info. Looking forward to the journey.
As someone mentioned during the stream, you should be able mix in 6 grams per gallon to full saturation. Per Chris Meckley 6 grams per gallon will fully dissolve if using high purity kalk.
I've been mixing 6 grams per gallon and have had no settling issues.
***this is without any addition of vinegar, just pure kalk added to rodi.
Very interesting, thanks - assuming that works it could change everything!
I drip kalkwasser 24/7 in my 100 gallon tank. 1 gallon of kalkwasser last one day. I have like five gallon containers made up way ahead of time and they are all sealed so all I have to do is take the top off and screw that onto my dosing pump and I'm back in business I am working on finding a bigger container so I don't have to mess with swapping them out so often it's really not a big deal but it's part of the hobby great video by the way
Its probably worth thinking about the fact that pH scale is logarithmic scale.
Good point - i'll mention that in the next update - that's a good way of explaining how significant the increase I've had is so far when it might not look it on paper 🙂
@@ReefDork 'That's a good way of explaining how significant the increase I've had is so far when it might not look it on paper.' most definitely.
Brilliant stuff as always. Really enjoy the livestreams there’s always so much food for thought. Thanks 👍🏻👍🏻
Don't be afraid to use fully saturated kalkwasser solution. Just be mindful. I use fully saturated kalkwasser mixed in 25l airtight container and use dosing pump to dose it overnight. Dosing pump is connected to PH controller as a backup measure incase of any failures to avoid kalkwasser nightmarish tank killer event by kalkwasser. So,if my ph goes over 8.55 it will shut dosing pump off till it falls back. My normal pH overnight 8.2-8.3 and daytime runs up to 8.5 sometimes over averaging around 8.45. I use kalkwasser, skimmer air-intake connected to outside to pull in fresh air and I'm super happy with the PH result 🙂 Hope your kalkwasser journey will be successful. Btw, my kalkwasser 25l mix last me 50 days on average.
Well with mine, I had it connected directly to my ro unit on the wall, and using flow switch to turn the solenoids on and off each time the water level is reached. Plus I didn't add so much to the water that quickly at you did, as a sudden change in the pH is stressful. Using a float switch connected to ro unit or a pump is more accurate. So only start off with a few drips and increase the flow bit by bit, till the pH is at the right level. So they will keep the pH at a stabled level constantly if done right and follow the instructions that come, I've never had any downsides.
Top vid Alex🤟 how are you finding the ATI essentials plus? Using All for reef and looking to try it… have you down an icy since using at all?
Early days and no icp tests as yet, but... It gave me a solid pH boost which is good. Although it crystallises more easily than Pro when it's cold so diluting it with ro is essential (in my room anyway) whereas the Pro was fine undiluted
Have to agree w/you. The Versa is "brilliant." I use mine to suck a gallon of sat. kalk from a bucket in my basement to my upstairs display tank every night... works a charm!
You should also check your trace elements given you are replacing about a third of your ATI Essentials plus (which contains a balanced amount of trace elements for a given comsumption rate) with Kalk, that contains no trace elements.
There's a good idea the practice of ACI Aquaculture: dosing the amount for a day just during the night. This will further stabilize the PH.
I normally relate the algae on my glass to temperature…. No matter how high or low my nutrients are the algae on glass or rocks stays the same, now if my tank temperature drops one or more degrees over a cold night I will wake up to a algae covered glass. This is my experience with 6 running tanks, but results my vary lol
Two containers, one 20ltr approx sealed lid, mix kalk in this one and leave to settle over day, once settled draw off the amount of water your tank evaporates each day into a container using the clearish solution avoiding what has settled in the bottom.
Use a dosing pump connected to the container you want to dose to the tank and dose top up amount overnight, spread the dosing over the night period 15mins on 15mins off.
I have used slurry but don't now as there is no way of knowing what impurities are being added, letting the kalk settle out in a sealed container will alow most of the empurities to settle out to the bottom.
It's likely the ph will climb over the lighting period and depending on how much is photosynthening in the tank it will likely be a climb of around .2 .
Stirers are good and ran two on a tank but it's when kalk can become dangerous if over dosed.
Using kalk in a auto top up is not so good being the kalk will be added possibly too quickly when topping up, dosing pump over lights off period is far safer and slower.
There's probably more to the simple method and the above is just what I do.
Have a great day.
I am only on the second part of your kalk journey and I was wondering, did you have any losses due to the dosing? If so, at what period and what do you think would have prevented it? thanks in advance.
BTW, when you took a swigg of your beer... are you sure it aint whiskey? lol
Hi Alex,
Did you test the potency of the kalk coming out of the reactor ? I would have thought a permanent stirrer would keep it at its max
I used a various speed rotisserie motor on my stirrer
I haven't tested the potency yet - might look into that in the future...
I've just started my kalk experiment, I had always intended to do it with your plan B and am using 6g per 3.7L. Will be interesting to see your next week results as you've now doubled the amount of kalk
Yeah I love the simplicity of plan b now. Expecting much bigger things from here on! Why 3.7L not 4 out of curiosity?
@@ReefDork seems too easy doesn't it. I'm doing 100ml 24x a day for now to see what happens. As for the 3.7L I googled us gallon to liters and it gave me 3.7.
Where are you dosing it to? I'm putting my above my xf350 directly into the tank
@@aaronjackson345 where the water falls over the final baffle in my sump before the return pumps...
I've been dosing for 3 days now and not noticed any difference, how long did it take for you to see any change
I made my own kalk stirrer which works super well!
if you need a picture of mine I'm happy to share how I made it. Its super easy.
What limits the amount of kalk pulver you can mix in one liter of water?
Only so much will dissolve, any more you add beyond that will just settle out at the bottom of your container and be wasted.
Kalkwasser caused my tank some of the best growth ever but it also caused a huge crash that killed multiple expensive SPS. I am now dosing All for Reef because it's much safer IMO. Also it's easier than having to keep filling up my top off with 100% kalkwasser. The growth is not as good as with Kalkwasser but I can't complain at the same time. I am getting great Montipora growth with all for reef.
i believe i had the same problem. i lost several sps frats including 2 large SCOP colonies
Why do you say the german word Kalkwasser and not kalkwater or something?
Stupid idea: Would it be possible to add calc pouder by an feeding machine to your sump and let a flow pump mix it?
Just because that's how it's generally referred to. The English translation is lime water...
No, you mustn't add the powder directly - it has to be dissolved.
Brilliant account of your kalk journey and it's role as your gateway drug to higher pH. I love that you don't gloss over the details. There's always gold in there.
Would be interested to find out whether the Reef Factory top up tracks how much water is added to the tank (and therefore your kalk ceiling/fluctuation)
Also...you should've known the versas would be calibrated....:-)
😁
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I know this video is 2 years old I hope you reply to me 😂 I want to learn how to Dose Kalk in a 13.5 Evo tank
I've made loads of videos on kalkwasser - this one shows how I dosed it on my Fluval Evo 13.5 th-cam.com/video/Os7LEiqmhvE/w-d-xo.html
Hey i just started my fish youtube channel any tips for growing
Upload regularly, find a good YT advice channel (like Nick Nimmin) and buy a cheap £10 lav mic for your phone
Could you not dose a spoon full & half or would than not dissolve enough & create a very minor slurry to speak?
Anything above max saturation will just settle out at the bottom of the container
@@ReefDork I watched further along & see you was only dosing half percentage as did a typical man & stopped reading instructions (also guilty) haha 😆