ALK and CA Question Again

[salty rick]

Since the other thread moved on down the line, I had a specific question about the relationship between these two.
If the CA goes up does the ALK go down and viceversa? Would that explain why I have diffculty keeping my CA up if the ALK is high?
As one of the sharks suggested, the balanced level of CA and ALK would be determined by the PH at the time? In other words, if you have a low PH of 8.0, it would be difficult to get the ALK and CA in the desired range?
Finally, how do you get the PH up without raising ALK?. I have tryed Seachem's Reef BUffer and Marine Buffer to raise the PH but is seems to raise ALK levels too. That seems to result in my CA level going down and making it difficult to raise.
I wish I was a chemistry major. ANyone want to do a Reef Chemistry 101 class on this board?

 

[richierich2000]

ok I have had that problem low ph I started using kalk to raise it I add (kent tech M) magnesium once a week and that has helped me too it stays at about 8.2-8.3 now it was like 7.9 to 8.1 hope this helps

 

[frankl15207]

Kalwasser took care of it for me too.

 

[q]

I do belive that the ph affects what reading you will get as it suppresses or lifts the readings. The Ca and alk is still the most important with ph being a bit of a wild card in the mix by affecting what the maxes can be at the time.
Some suggestions are:
If your skimmer is in a closed cabinit have it get it's air source from outside the enclosure.
Make sure you are not overfeeding as waste will decay and affect ph and alk
I have had good luck with the reef buffer in the past but I also drip kalk.
Not reccommended but if your levels are stable just stop measuring ph. I got lazy and never bought another test kit. I just keep up on the Ca and Alk and make sure that no algea is growing. Just one less thing to worry about.