question for Ca Rx users

[TDEVIL]

i see a lot of reefers these days that have a calcium reactor and are still having to have another means of keeping the calcuim levels up, either with the use of a Kalk Rx or by other means.

question, is this mainly due to the fact that the calcium reactor isnt large enough for the demands that the corals are putting on the reactor now vs when the reactor was bought? or the media used?

the reason i ask is because i plan on buying one (when i get a job, lol) wander if it really is worth the $$ if i will still have to add more calcium to the tank.
is it better to get one that is a lot larger than one that would normally be recomended for my tank. i am/was thinking about the coralife 500 Rx (mainly for the price) and have been looking at a few others (Geo, MRC, etc).

i just dont want to buy the C reactor and then have to turn around and buy a K reactor

Make any sense
TIA

Jay

 

[sasquatch]

Jay, great question, I havent a clue but I will be watching this as that road is going to open soon for me too. Steve

 

[TDEVIL]

actually the road opened a long time ago, lol, just didnt buy one when i actually had a job, noooooo, i had to buy a new truck, lol

Jay

 

[billyr98]

the main reason for dosing kalk or running a kalk reactor with Calcium reactors are for keeping your PH in the correct range.. People sometimes have problems with their PH when using a calcium reactor...

I have a MRC 4 getting ready to be put in my 210g reef real soon.. I will keep ya posted...

 

[TDEVIL]

that is true, Billy
i do understand that the effluent will have some excess Co2, but a second chamber w/ media in it can help, macro algae can help take the excess Co2 out of the water, and raising the Alk a bit can help also. they arnt perfect but, do help. there is also the idea of running the line from the C reactor to the skimmer, but im not sure there would be enough contact time w/ the air to actually help a lot, it is an idea though.

i could handle adding a bit of lime water (Kalk) to the tank to help offset the effluent's Ph, such as top off water. it is just the idea of having to keep the calcium levels up because the $300 C reactor doesnt do what it was purchased to do.

Jay

 

[prow]

hummmmmm, well i think your looking at a Ca reactor wrong. a better name would be a alk reactor. because what it does is deliever alk to the tank. because of the reactions needed to do this you get Ca added as a bounus. any Ca reactor will give a balanced amount of Ca and alk. if you drip the effluent into say a skimmer you will reduce the alk being supplied via the Ca reactor. if you are having issues with maintaining the Ca+ your Mg+ is more than likey low, fix that and your Ca and alk should be maintained by the Ca reactor in proper proportions.

for excess CO2 just make sure you have enough flow with good surface aggitation and of course "fresh" air circulating with in the room and tank.

 

[Warnberg]

A properly setup and controlled Calcium reactor should maintain calcium levels in a tank and should not effect ph. Yes the effluent that come out of the reactor is low in ph, it's supposed to be, a ph of 6.5 is about where is should be. Also if the reactor is working correctly you should be getting CO2 out with the effluent, if you do there is something wrong.
Right now, in my 240, my calcium level is at 420 ppm and my alk is at 7.5 dHK, this is maintained and accomplished with my calcium reactor. I was unable to maintain levels like this with dosing.

http://www.reefkeeping.com/issues/2002-05/sh/feature/index.php

One last thought, yes I do on occasion have to add turbo calcium to bring levels back to where I want them, reason? Because I am using IO salt and forgot to add it before I did a 40 gallon water change.

 

[TDEVIL]

i understand that the levels need to be right and the reactor will keep them there and i havent bought a reactor yet.

there are a lot of reefers out there that have a C reactor and then down the road, as the corals grow, they end up buying a K reactor to keep the levels where they need to be or they dose lime water(Kalk) to keep the levels up.

maybe im a bit confusing or im not asking the Q right, or something

Jay

 

[TDEVIL]

ok, so you dont, arnt think of, buying a K reactor. the C reactor is keeping up with the growth needs?

Jay

 

[Warnberg]

Humm....
From article sent
"In its most basic form, a calcium reactor is simply a container filled with calcium carbonate (CaCO3) media over which aquarium water is passed with the addition of carbon dioxide. Adding carbon dioxide lowers the pH of the water, making it acidic, and dissolving the calcium carbonate to provide the aquarium with calcium and alkalinity."

So I'm confused as to what it is you are referring to as a K reactor?

 

[TDEVIL]

my bad, lol

a Kalk reactor

Jay

 

[billyr98]

Here is a good article for reading about Ca Reactors too

http://www.cnidarianreef.com/faq.cfm?FID=37

 

[TDEVIL]

thanks Billy

let me see if i can make my question a little more clear.

i see this with a lot of reefers, they buy a calcium reactor and have it running for a while then they notice that the demands of the corals are more than the calcium reactor can handle (as the corals grow) so they buy a kalk reactor to help or they dose to keep the levels up to where they need to be.

so basically, when i buy a reactor should i get a large one for like a 1000g tank or would one for a 500g tank work to where i wouldnt have to buy a Kalk reactor later down the line. my water volume is around 250g-300g gross

i am trying to buy the right size reactor for my tank (when i get the $$$), so i dont have to dose anymore to keep the levels @ 420 (why they are purchased) and if the Calcuim reactor wont keep it up to that level in the long term, then......

Jay

 

[prow]

aaahhhh i think the issue most have, reason for adding Ca+ later, Warnberg stated already. most salts dont have the correct amount of Ca+ in the mix or if they do the alk is low. so over time with water changes the Ca and alk in the tank gets off. every now and then you have to add/dose to bring it back to balance. unless you dose your water your using to change to match the levels of the tanks Ca+ and alk you will need to correct it after a few water changes. the normal water changes of 10-20% will only effect the tanks levels slightly. so over many water changes the tanks levels will slowly get off. if you change 100% of you water it will be off the same principle applies to water changes but your just changing 100% of the water bit by bit. i hope i said this so it clear.


o ok what to do. either bring the new water during changes levels to match the tanks levels or dose the tank every now and so its balanced. its still much easier to use a Ca+ reactor and cheaper than dosing other ways and you only have to add more Ca every few months, much easier than daily dosing. IMO if you never change the water the Ca+ and alk will remain constant. thais if the reactor is set up right.

 

[Warnberg]

There are lots of reactors out there to choose from. My Schuran Jetstream 1 Calcium Reactor is supposed to be able to handle up to a 800 gallon tank. I would recommend you buy something that would handle your calcium load when your tank is fully stocked, give yourself some wiggle room as well.. plan ahead..

Not to get off the subject but I just went and looked at the price on the reactor I have... ouch, it really went up...

 

[TDEVIL]

thanks guys,

one thing i always try to do is keep the w/c water levels at the tank levels, not always easy to get it right on, so i can understand how that would play a part.

Dave, i wander if that is the real issue? i think it would be almost imposible to judge how much a fully stocked tank would demand, we all know how the SPS corals differ from one to the next and from one tank to the next.
for example; monti cap's, usually fast growers, which i have 3 of, a green, orange, and a purple w/ blue polyps. the green out grows the other 2 10 fold. i consider that pretty good since i have a few issues w/ the tank right now (which could/does have an affect on their growth)

maybe i will get the MRC-CR6 dual readtor and just hope it will be large enough

Jay

 

[Warnberg]

You could always use (http://www.advancedaquarist.com/issues/april2004/chem.htm) for topoff water if it can't keep up....

 

[TDEVIL]

i am using the "balling method" right now which is pretty much what that is.

my maine point is if i spend the $5-600 to help make life easier then turn around and have to dose again then the reactor didnt make my life easier and w/ that money i could have made a lot of the additives in the link. maybe im just over thinking this.

i understand that the dosing wont be as much as i dose now, more to help the reactor keep up or to offset the w/c's, but dosing is dosing and it is simple to make the dosing mix, there is also a video on reefvideos.com on how to do it (dowflake thumbnail)

Jay

 

[Warnberg]

I have run my reactor for about a year now, I never dose anymore and I used about half the media so far, I did refill the media about a month ago so total cost for the year is about 25.00 bucks for media. The CO2 tank hasn't drop 5 lbs of pressure so no worries there either.

Dosing is much more expensive if you dose a lot.

 

[cheeks69]

thanks Billy i see this with a lot of reefers, they buy a calcium reactor and have it running for a while then they notice that the demands of the corals are more than the calcium reactor can handle (as the corals grow) so they buy a kalk reactor to help or they dose to keep the levels up to where they need to be.

so basically, when i buy a reactor should i get a large one for like a 1000g tank or would one for a 500g tank work to where i wouldnt have to buy a Kalk reactor later down the line. my water volume is around 250g-300g gross

i am trying to buy the right size reactor for my tank (when i get the $$$), so i dont have to dose anymore to keep the levels @ 420 (why they are purchased) and if the Calcuim reactor wont keep it up to that level in the long term, then......

Jay

I don't see why you would have to buy a larger C reactor all you would need to do is increase the CO2 levels so the media can dissolve more quickly. The problem is ph ! I currently topoff with kalk and dose with 2 parts and it's a real pain, it's very difficult to maintain the proper cal/alk parameters with alot of calcium demanding livestock and testing is constanly necessary...I'm also looking at the GEO reactor.

for excess CO2 just make sure you have enough flow with good surface aggitation and of course "fresh" air circulating with in the room and tank.

That does not always correct the ph problem especially during the wintertime when co2 levels in the house will increase with all the windows closed.

Randy Holmes-Farley:

A common cause of low pH in a reef tank is the use of a calcium carbonate/carbon dioxide reactor. These reactors use acidic carbon dioxide to dissolve calcium carbonate, and the effect is to deliver a substantial, but transient, amount of acid to the tank. Ideally, the carbon dioxide is blown back out of the tank after it has been used to dissolve the CaCO3. In reality, however, this process does not go to completion, and aquaria using CaCO3/CO2 reactors typically run at the low pH end of the spectrum.

The solutions that follow assume that the reactor is properly adjusted. A maladjusted reactor can drive the pH down even lower than usual, and in that case, proper adjustment is the first step. How to set the various parameters of a reactor is beyond the scope of this article, but from this standpoint, the pH or the alkalinity of the effluent must not be too low.

Many approaches have been suggested, with varying success, to minimize the low pH problem encountered with CaCO3/CO2 reactors. One is to use a two-stage reactor that passes the fluid through a second chamber of CaCO3 before releasing it into the tank. Dissolving additional CaCO3 has the effect of raising the pH, and also raising both the calcium and alkalinity levels in the effluent. This approach seems to be successful at raising the pH of the effluent, but it cannot raise it all the way to the tank's pH, so the low pH problem does not completely disappear.

Another approach is to aerate the effluent before it is delivered to the tank. In this case, the goal is to blow off the excess CO2 before it gets to the tank. This approach can work in theory, but typically does not in practice because not enough degassing time is permitted before the effluent enters the tank. Another concern with this approach is that if it really were successful at raising the pH, the supersaturation of CaCO3 in the effluent might rise high enough to cause reprecipitation of CaCO3 in the reactor, fouling it and reducing its effectiveness.

A final approach, and probably the most successful, is to combine the CaCO3/CO2 reactor with another alkalinity supplementation scheme that raises pH. The most useful method in this application is limewater. In this situation, the limewater is not being used to provide large amounts of calcium or alkalinity, but to soak up some of the excess CO2, and thereby raise the pH. The amount of limewater needed is not as large as for full maintenance of calcium and alkalinity. The limewater addition can also be put on a timer to add it only at night and early morning when the daily pH lows are most likely to be problematic. The limewater addition could also be on a pH controller, so that it is added only when the pH gets unusually low (such as below pH 7.8 or so).

Low ph