Silly question about vinegar n kalk

[GrampaDon]

I'm wanting to eliminate the stuff left over at the bottom of my ATO.

So when dissolving kalk into vinegar ,how long does it take to complete this step.?

I'm low dosing right now at 1 tsp per gal. Using Kalk + 2 ,at about 5-6 gal evaporation per week on a 150g tank with a light SPS/LPS/Zoa's load.

[Palting]

Ask this over at the chemistry forum. The chemistry gurus, the guys who could best answer this for you, hang out there more often than they do here at the reef discussion forum. BTW, no question is silly. This is a hobby, meant to be silly, so silly questions in a silly hobby are not silly :D. Dunno if I made sense there, or was just being silly LOL!

[disc1]

Ask this over at the chemistry forum. The chemistry gurus, the guys who could best answer this for you, hang out there more often than they do here at the reef discussion forum. BTW, no question is silly. This is a hobby, meant to be silly, so silly questions in a silly hobby are not silly :D. Dunno if I made sense there, or was just being silly LOL!

Sometimes the Chemistry Forum comes to you!

I'm wanting to eliminate the stuff left over at the bottom of my ATO.

No, you don't. The gunk at the bottom does no harm, and will actually help to purify the kalk you are using by forcing any heavy metals out of solution into the gunk and trapping them there. You can wait until it gets ridiculous and clean it then. In reality, that gunk is your friend.

Try to keep your pump elevated above the gunk. You don't want to put it into your tank. You want to take the clear solution off the top.

[Psyops]

Sometimes the Chemistry Forum comes to you!



No, you don't. The gunk at the bottom does no harm, and will actually help to purify the kalk you are using by forcing any heavy metals out of solution into the gunk and trapping them there. You can wait until it gets ridiculous and clean it then. In reality, that gunk is your friend.

Try to keep your pump elevated above the gunk. You don't want to put it into your tank. You want to take the clear solution off the top.

Good to know Disc1. So if I dump more 5 gallon bucketfull of dissolved kalk into this bucket of gunk, then I will be introducing more of those impurities into the DT?

Aside from cleaning the gunk when adding the kalk solution weekly, how else would add kalk solution to the ATO bucket not to disturb the sedimentation? I worry I don't have the kalk mixing well enough into the solution. BTW, sorry to hijack the thread.

[GrampaDon]

Yes Palting I understand your thoughts. But really this question doesnt need to clutter the Chem forum. [And Im like a outhouse in a elevator there anyway.]:facepalm:

I didnt know that the bottom layer of kalk absorbs heavy metals. Good to know. [I do keep the pump about 3in from the bottom.]

But what about the question I asked , how long does vinegar take to dissolve the kalk.?

This is Randy's recipe ,but im assuming the kalk n vinegar are first mixed ,and then added to the RO for the ATO.

[Palting]

OK, I'll give it a shot, then. Not a chem guru, but I've been asking the chem boys a lot of questions about kalk the last few months.

Vinegar increases the capacity of the water to dissolve more kalk. Plain RODI can only effectively handle a 2 tbsp/gallon concentration, anything more will stay as precipitate. Adding vinegar increases this capacity, I believe to something like 3 tbsp/gallon.

What settles in the bottom of the reservoir at 2 tbsp/gallon plain RODI is not undissolved kalk, but impurities you do not want added to the tank. As impurities, they should not dissolve even if you add vinegar.

If you inadertently added more than 2tsp/gallon and you have undisolved kalk, then the vinegar will dissolve that portion of undissolved kalk likely almost immediately, but will still leave a residue of impurities.

Now, here's the kicker. I now use a kalk reactor, and it kicks up that kalk fairly high, and there is actually very little residue if I let it go until all the powder is gone. So, I assumed that the residue that would normally be left in the bottom of an ATO reservoir is making it into the DT. The chem gurus, no other than Randy the kalk expert and kalk proponent, said that that was OK.

HTH!! Maybe David can clarify it better.

[GrampaDon]

Vinegar increases the capacity of the water to dissolve more kalk. Plain RODI can only effectively handle a 2 tbsp/gallon concentration, anything more will stay as precipitate. Adding vinegar increases this capacity, I believe to something like 3 tbsp/gallon.

What settles in the bottom of the reservoir at 2 tbsp/gallon plain RODI is not undissolved kalk, but impurities you do not want added to the tank. As impurities, they should not dissolve even if you add vinegar.

If you inadertently added more than 2tsp/gallon and you have undisolved kalk, then the vinegar will dissolve that portion of undissolved kalk likely almost immediately, but will still leave a residue of impurities.



HTH!! Maybe David can clarify it better.


Thank you David for that clarification.

:wave::wave::wave: