Reef nutrition

Ryan’s 40G first reef

rdriggett said:
ALK is dropping despite 15ML/day of AFR. 8.2 from Hanna and 7.2 from RedSea. I dont know who to believe. Calcium is 420-450 and mag is ~1500. Should I get alk/calc/mag test kits from Salifert? I was hoping I would have alk consumption beginning to be dialed in by now but it's looking like it wont be by my vacation.
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I'd trust the Hanna alk because it's not dependent on your eye doing a titration check. But of course make sure you're wiping that cuvette clean with a microfiber cloth before getting the zero and test readings.

Any kit is probably going to be +/- 10% depending on age/lot of the reagents so I wouldn't chase numbers too bad, but rather try to hit stability.
 
Darkxerox said:
I'd trust the Hanna alk because it's not dependent on your eye doing a titration check. But of course make sure you're wiping that cuvette clean with a microfiber cloth before getting the zero and test readings.

Any kit is probably going to be +/- 10% depending on age/lot of the reagents so I wouldn't chase numbers too bad, but rather try to hit stability.
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I’m aiming for stability via my Hanna alk tester. Ideally it would stay between 9 and 10. I’ll increase AFR dosing to try to maintain 9.
 
I’ve been getting an insane amount of micro bubbles and I think it’s my skimmer. It didn’t come with the bottom foam piece. I’ll cut some foam to fit but will this fix my micro bubble issue?
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Edit: yup, that fixed it! No more micro bubbles!
 
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@RandyC that is a very interesting article. They didn't expel their zooxanthellae. I was wondering about temp changes during his flight and car ride home. In their controlled experiment they kept the temp the same. I don't have enough of any coral to try this out, but since picking up some montis today I might in awhile...
 
I confirmed via salifert alk test that my hanna is near accurate. My redsea alk pro kit seems to read low. It's not my hanna reagent going bad, my tank drops from 9.X to 7.X in under 2 weeks. Wild.
 
Thanks to advice I’ve used EDPM rubber lining to completely seal my lid to AIO filter gap. Should reduce the amount of snails I find jammed in my return pump to near zero.
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Either my doser hasn't been working or 20-25ML of AFR isnt holding my alk up at all. Salifert and Hanna agree Alk is in the mid 7s. I just water changed with a low 9s reading on the 19th. How did I lose 2dKh in 3 days? My salinity is 1ppt less because my ato was a bit generous in its new position. Can that swing it that much?
 
Also I just found flatworms and tube worms with 2x, inches long shrimp like antenna AND brown sub MM sized flat worms on the glass. I hope my tank survives two weeks of pests while I'm gone.
 
Installed a second mlw-10 expecting to retire my too powerful mlw-30 but I didn’t like the flow. So now I’m running all 3. My torches are mad but they should adjust.
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rdriggett said:
Either my doser hasn't been working or 20-25ML of AFR isnt holding my alk up at all. Salifert and Hanna agree Alk is in the mid 7s. I just water changed with a low 9s reading on the 19th. How did I lose 2dKh in 3 days? My salinity is 1ppt less because my ato was a bit generous in its new position. Can that swing it that much?
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Regarding if it's dosing, I put a rubber band around my Voss bottles so I can mark the liquid level. 25ml a day you should be able to see movement on pretty quickly.

The other trick i did is weigh out a container, then set it so that the doser pumps into it. 1ml of water weighs 1g. With minerals it might be a bit better, but ignore that. You then can confirm that the doser is dumping out the amount you expect, even after it sits all day and any bubbles or whatever have snuck into the line.
 
richiev said:
Regarding if it's dosing, I put a rubber band around my Voss bottles so I can mark the liquid level. 25ml a day you should be able to see movement on pretty quickly.

The other trick i did is weigh out a container, then set it so that the doser pumps into it. 1ml of water weighs 1g. With minerals it might be a bit better, but ignore that. You then can confirm that the doser is dumping out the amount you expect, even after it sits all day and any bubbles or whatever have snuck into the line.
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Great tip, thank you.

I have copied the “medium sized wavemakers on either side of the rear glass with a larger wavemaker on the peninsula side” idea to fix some dead spots and create more flow.
So far corals seem much less happy but we’ll see if they adjust.
 
Found out I had been running my tank at 1.027/1.028 because I was shooting for my refractometer line to be just above 35ppt. I corrected to 1.026/the bottom of the 35ppt line and I am retesting rn.
Edit: Salifert reads 6.8 and Hanna reads 7.1 for Alk. Looks like AFR does basically nothing for me. I might have to switch to 2 part dosing right before a trip which is a nightmare.
 
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rdriggett said:
Found out I had been running my tank at 1.027/1.028 because I was shooting for my refractometer line to be just above 35ppt. I corrected to 1.026/the bottom of the 35ppt line and I am retesting rn.
Edit: Salifert reads 6.8 and Hanna reads 7.1 for Alk. Looks like AFR does basically nothing for me. I might have to switch to 2 part dosing right before a trip which is a nightmare.
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Don't change anything right before you leave.

Things are used to what they are now, don't chase numbers and make slow corrections.

AFR takes a while to work, and I have no personal experience with it, but don't change anything right before you leave.

Did I mention, you shouldn't change anything right before you leave?
 
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