Cali Kid Corals

Rygh's 250 gallon - rev.2

That’s how I do it. I don’t like the setups that combine it with the ato. I tried that way and my experience was that the dosing wasn’t consistent. I set up my DOS to dose (fully saturated kalkwasser) 2000ml over 24 hours. When my demand was higher I had it up at 2400ml which was still under my evaporation rate. I think if my demand was much more I would have fired up the carx to make up the difference.
 
Latest full tank shot.
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you tank looks great for a low pH, but whats the damage that it's doing to your tank ? slow growth? I'm trying to find out what I might be facing since my pH gets stuck at 7.9 and never got above that mark even I tried to pull air tube from outside.
 
you tank looks great for a low pH, but whats the damage that it's doing to your tank ? slow growth? I'm trying to find out what I might be facing since my pH gets stuck at 7.9 and never got above that mark even I tried to pull air tube from outside.

At 7.6-7.9, PH is not that big of a problem.
Slightly slower growth, especially coralline algae. But it is not like I measure growth or really care that much.
And some corals do not seem to mind low PH.

A bigger deal is that I am right on the border of a serious problem.
If I accidentally let Alk or Ca get out of range, then corals get unhappy very fast.
Which has happened. Work gets busy ... you forget to check weekly ... oops.
 
got it, but i'm currently on daily auto dosing H. Balling method by using aquaforest 123, would that help to manage alk/ca getting out of range?
 
got it, but i'm currently on daily auto dosing H. Balling method by using aquaforest 123, would that help to manage alk/ca getting out of range?
Sure. But I auto-dose also, and have auto salt water exchange, and still managed to mess it up.
You can forget to fill reservoir, and as corals are added/grow, what you dose changes, so you have to check and tweak.

It is all a big trade off on risk/growth/expense.

My hope long term:
I always auto-dose some regular amount of Kalk hourly.
But eventually the new Alk/Ca monitors get good enough to fine tune the rest with normal two part dosers.
 
For the morbidly curious: Over the last 15 years or so of reef tanking:
I have never had a full tank crash. Lucky!
I have had 1 Ich outbreak that wiped out almost all of the fish. Bad QT.
I have had 2 partial crashes that wiped out > 50% of the coral. Bad chemical balances.
I have had numerous mini-crashes with major RTN/STN. Many causes.
And a couple of times, all of one species of coral suddenly and inexplicably died.
But the worst is still the ongoing Majano infestation.
 
So I might have a little issue with my ventilation system....

I have had a lot of condensation, even mentioned in thread above, so went to check on it,
and the pipe disintegrated on me.

vent.JPG
 
That is funny. Look at all that duct tape. Are you going to go with a rigid galvanized ducting this time around? What size is that? You could do it out of pvc too possibly.
 
That is funny. Look at all that duct tape. Are you going to go with a rigid galvanized ducting this time around? What size is that? You could do it out of pvc too possibly.

Duct tape ... on a duct. Crazy stuff!!
No, I am not going to just wrap the little hole in more duct tape. :)

It is a 6" main line, going to 3 x 3" lines. (2 for DT, 1 for sump)
It uses a bathroom vent fan.

I will probably switch it all to PVC dust collection type hose.
 
Busy weekend.

Fixed my ventilation system!
Nice plastic pipe the whole way. No more drips from too much humidity in the hood.

Installed my new Kalk reactor.
So dosing Kalk and two part. (Minimal two part hopefully)
Not on ATO, but on a timer.

IMG_2611.jpg
 
Happy with PH now!!

Changes:
Reduced Vinegar dosing (I was overdoing it, not just for PH) + 0.1
Added Kalk reactor (various reasons, not just PH) + 0.2
Calibrated probe + 0.1

So no more drops to nearly 7.6


ph.jpeg
 
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