Alkalinity Question

[shaginwagon13]

This might sound stupid but i tested my tank today and somehow my alkalinity is up around 23-24...is this bad?? i know i was told it should be around 10 so should i do some water changes to get it back down?

[drillsar]

What kind of test kit you using, Did you dose or something?

[tmz]

I don't know what your measure is dkh? If so ,23 /24 is very high. I would double check my test method to be sure it is actually that high. Unless you overdosed a buffer or your calcium reactor is pushing out tooomuch alkalainity it should not be anywhere near that amount. 7-14dkh is ok (equivalent to 2.5 -5 meq/l.If it is actually 23 or so dkh ,you should do some water changes to get it down. Turn off the calcium reactor untill you do since it doses both calcium and alkalinity.
Good Luck

[drillsar]

some cheap test kits will give you a false reading as well

[shaginwagon13]

<a href=showthread.php?s=&postid=11971913#post11971913 target=_blank>Originally posted</a> by drillsar
What kind of test kit you using, Did you dose or something?

Ya i dosed the tank and was taking the PH reading off my ph monitor because i thought that it was the only thing it would affect.....rookie mistake but i learned lol

ill do some water changes tomorrow to get it down

[drillsar]

what did you dose with? Im sure your calcium level is high to

[shaginwagon13]

I dosed with a PH buffer because my PH was is running around 7.90-8.00 and i wanted to get it up a little so i dosed it with Kent Marine Buffer DKH for the last week or so. I have a pretty large tank so the PH would always settle back down so I would keep dosing it everyday until today I was told that Alkalinity can also be affected and when i tested it was threw the roof. So now i have my Alkalinity too high and my PH hasnt moved haha

[tmz]

I've probably done something like that. FYI,buffers are not a good way to manage ph. If you wan't rasie ph consider dosing limewater(kalk wasser)

[Randy Holmes-Farley]

That is excessively high. It will drop on its own, but if anything looks stressed in the tank, you might try water changes or adding a mineral acid (very risky due to overdosing possibilities). You may notice precipitation of calcium carbonate on heaters, pumps, possibly even the glass.

[Bremmon]

I have one of those test kits where you drip a solution into a vial one drop at a time and count the number of drops until the water being tested turns a certain color. Then you have to divide the number of drops by 4.

I have read where some have forgotten to do the division part (though not necessarily true in your case).

How many times did you run the test? If you have a questionable reading, always retest just to make sure you have a consistent reading. You may have done this already, but thought I would throw that out there in case you hadn't :)

[NewFish3]

<a href=showthread.php?s=&postid=11971965#post11971965 target=_blank>Originally posted</a> by drillsar
some cheap test kits will give you a false reading as well

So what is a good brand for testing the alkalinity

I have a API kit fir PH, nitrates, Nitrites, ammonia.....are the API kits ok ???

SORRY for the hijack.....maybe this can help you too.

Thanks

[Randy Holmes-Farley]

Test your salt mix if you think the tank may have been overdosed. if it reads high too, then either the test is not useful, or the salt mix is out of whack (fairly unlikely).

[drillsar]

Salifert are good test kits, API are ok but can be off. Randy has a good point the way to see if your test kit is working is test your salt water mix and if thats off then most likely your test kit is bad.