Help me dial this in...

nm reef

nm reef

Active Member
...I finally hooked up the calcium reactor and have a bubble of co2 per 3-4 secs...drop per sec effluent into the sump...effulent PH is currently at 7.6 and I want to bring it down slowly. My target for the effluent PH is 6.8....does that sound right for effluent coming from the second chamber? I just tested my water using Salifert tests and have the following levels:
PH- 8.0/8.3 with Salifert and 8.3 on the button with PH monitor
calcium- 420 ppm
alkalinity- 7.8 dKH
...any advice and/or pointers would be appreciated. With my work schedule I plan to test the water daily for a few weeks just to insure things progress smoothly....
 
moray345

moray345

Active Member
man yall are amazing using those big words and all i have no idea what you said but some day hope to:rolleyes:
 
tony detroit

tony detroit

Active Member
Couple things I've learned on mine.
1. Put a black line where the new media is now. In a month it'll be a couple inches lower.
2. Dual chambers will have a higher pH on the effluent than a single will. 6.8 should be fine. Run it for a month and test your alk. If it is still too low then turn her up. You can do so
Raise CO2-lower pH
Lower Co2-raise pH
Speed up effluent drip-higher pH
Slow down effluent drip-lower pH
You can also play with the amount of CO2 saturation, after a certain point the water becomes completely saturated and the CO2 will bubble out of solution. I usually find this point and once I get there, I speed up the waterflow of the effluent a bit and just leave it there and let the tank adjust to it.
Quick question for ya. Are you dripping kalk? I've noticed you've been picking up a lot of SPS lately. If you aren't dripping kalk, give the idea some serious thought. I saw results in 2 weeks after I started. I ran a reactor 6 months and saw hardly 1/4 of the growth when I ran them together. Best of luck to ya.
tony
 
bbq bob

bbq bob

New Member
sounds good i try to keep my effluent between6.7/6.8.you are on the right track when you say slowly!!!!i am dosing 25cc/min in a 125.you will notice your ph drop a little in your tank if you do not have a refugium with lots of culerpa.also be careful not to let your ph drop in your reactor drop below 6.5 or it will cause your media to get soft and affect your water flow,also when you cut back your water flow cut back your co2.......bob
 
solonfairy

solonfairy

Member
i quickly found that i need to increase the eff drip to be a little faster than a drip per sec... and my bubble count is around 1per sec too
as said... make small changes and wait a few days... logging chemistry trends during that time
everybody's reactor has to be set differently depending on tank size, types of corals, and tank maturity
then when you think you have it set... you will have to increase it because your corals are growing and consuming more
 
reefnut

reefnut

Active Member
My target for the effluent PH is 6.8....does that sound right for effluent coming from the second chamber?
What kind of media are you using?? Is there anyway to test the first chamber??... to make sure the first chamber is not under 6.5??
 
reefnut

reefnut

Active Member

Originally posted by SolonFairy
common thought is that the eff from chamber two is around .2 pH higher than chamber 1
6.8 from the second chamber should be good then IMO. I'm running my single stage at 6.6 and it seems to be doing pretty good.
 
golfish

golfish

Active Member
Hmmm, I've seen that somewhere before:)
Set the effluent drip rate to a steady stream just so there's no drops. I pretty much run my drip rate wide open. If your using ARM I'd set the pH to around 6.9-7.0 and let it run for an hour or two and check the alk of the effluent, your looking for 2-3 times what your shooting for in the tank..say 25 kh...
 
golfish

golfish

Active Member

Originally posted by SolonFairy
yeah.. its on the myreef c-reactor directions
:rolleyes: No, I'm pretty sure it was in my tank room.
 
reefnut

reefnut

Active Member

Originally posted by golfish
NMReef, is that a Coca-Cola glass just above the reactor sitting on that bench? :D
lol, seen that too... I have a few just like it...
 
solonfairy

solonfairy

Member

Originally posted by golfish
:rolleyes: No, I'm pretty sure it was in my tank room.
I am sorry, i dont believe i have ever been in your tank room.
 
golfish

golfish

Active Member
Let me start over...
Hmmm, I've seen that somewhere before....maybe because its my old ca reactor that was in my tank room.:rolleyes:
 
reefnut

reefnut

Active Member
Hmmm, I've seen that somewhere before
golfish was referring to NM's calcium reactor...
yeah.. its on the myreef c-reactor directions
SolonFairy was referring to the this... "common thought is that the eff from chamber two is around .2 pH higher than chamber 1"
Just a miscommunication thing... :)
 
nm reef

nm reef

Active Member
Very kewl.....y'all spotted the "budweiser" glass sittin' there. It once was a coke glass...but it now consumes only Bud for me.
There is no reasonable means of testing the PH of the first chamber...and several sources seem to indicate .2-.3 higher for the second chamber. Thats the range I'm shotting for 6.8-6.9
If it needs adjustment from there I'll have a better starting point. I have slightly increased the bubble rate and the drip rate...effluent PH just checked at 7.2 and the system PH is holding steady at 8.2.
I am using the ARM media...thanks for the pointers and experience....when I check the alk of the effluent I should be 3 times higher than the target range of the system? Did I understand that correct? System has maintained a calcium of 420-450 and a alk of 7.8-9.0 dKH for a long time now. So....if I understand correctly I can check the effluent alk and it should be 25-27 dKH.....is that right?
 
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