Kalkwasser (night drip or ATO)
 

Is it better to drip a 1.25 quart of full strength Kalk at night via gravity drip or a half strength Kalk solution done steady throughout the day in in ATO? Both would provide roighly the same amount of Kalk to the tank. Thanks in advance for your help.

Kalk dosing will typically raise PH..
PH is typically lowest at night..

typically "best" to dose a product that raises PH when the PH is lowest to help keep it more stable..

As long as the kalk dosage isn't causing your PH to be too high then doing it at the daytime isn't bad either..

I'd also consider the alkalinity swing. A steady dose might be preferable, depending on the total alkalinity swing.

Seems like a pain to turn a kalk drip on/off. If you're pumping it, then a light timer would work, I suppose.

I would bet that only a steady drip of half strength kalk won't affect pH much, especially if the tank has proper aeration. I would also bet that most people using kalk just let it go all day every day.

I have been doing the ATO full strength running through a reactor with my cal reactor.

Your miles may vary, but your better off just dripping full time keeping things equal as can be as bertoni suggest.

If ph get out of whack or to high then you can slow the drip rate down and top off with ro/di water when or if needed. key factor is keep measuring

Many years ago I was told to use it all the time in my make up water.
Now I use a CA reactor.

That was strange advice

I just use it in my ATO so it goes 24/7, my evaporation rate is fairly steady so this method works for me.

Why would you say that?

If you knew Greg Scheimer you would not think so.

I run it through an ATO

If by make up water, you mean the RODI water used with your salt mix, then that seems strange.

It wouldn't take much to overshoot alk and Ca, causing precipitation.

Maybe I'm not understanding what Vinny is talking about?

I agree that mixing lime into saltwater will cause calcium carbonate precipitation if too much is added in one shot, but I thought we were discussing fresh water, which will dissolve up to 2 tsp per gallon. Any excess will sit at the bottom of the reservoir after settling, and can dissolve when more fresh water is added.

What I meant is all the make up water should contain kalk.

You mean top off water right, make up water to me aould mean your saltwater. Kalk should not be added to Saltwater only your top off straight RODI water

Yes top off.

Top off water makes sense.

I thought he meant top off water when he said make up water.

Now I see what you mean, I'm sure he knows better.

:thumbsup:

I run fully saturated kalk in my ATO, I have it so that it will go off a few of times a day (both during the day and at night) so that it helps raise the overall PH. But its not being dripped it, its pumping a good quarter to half liter at a time into my ~450 liter tank. Its pumped right into the skimmer compartment of my sump and I do run a PH controller to cut off the return if needed, its saved me before too during an ATO failure.

I monitor my pH and drip when it falls under 8.34 to maintain an Alk of 9. This loop is always running. I have massive aeration of fresh air so that keeps my measured pH and Alk directly correlated.

I determined the 8.34 experimentally. I changed the set point slightly and measured the resulting Alk. I recheck every month when I calibrate.

I use two probes to make sure I don't have runaways and other failsafes like salinity, etc....

I don't use a doser. I use a solenoid from my RODI reservoir to feed my kalk reactor which drips in the highest agitation region in the overflow / sump.

This has worked for about 5 years with great success except when I lost my outside air aeration for a week due to laziness (maintenance of the aerator). The pH and Alk got disconnected as the inside air CO2 levels were much much higher and more volatile. This caused an Alk spike and sps burn.

When running properly, I can maintain Alk constant 24/7.

I mixed kalk in my ato water and for me it worked very well to keep cal, alk and ph levels very stable and at the proper levels. I had a lot of sps some acans and clams so higher demand for alk and cal.

I always have used it in my ATO.