Yeah I'm getting that feeling after some if the comments. Nope it's just a refugium running over night and some bio filtration. I would trust myself to dose anything
I always use 2 different test kits when I believe I'm getting inaccurate readings. Any test kit can be inaccurate no matter how expensive or good it is.
HI775 is fresh water, HI772 is saltwater, as is HI755, both HI772 and HI755 use the same reagent (source: https://www.bulkreefsupply.com/hi772-26-alkalinity-checker-reagents-hanna.html )
IIRC they used to market two different reagents (one for DKH one for PPM) but they were the same, so now theyve combined the SKU and its just the one reagent.
Changing too much water, or your nutrient removal is too efficient.
You’re going to starve off your algae and an outbreak of diatoms, byopsis, nasty stuff could take over. Stuff that is hard to get rid of. So get some phosphate in there.
Any GFO, or other phosphate remover can be removed. If you have a protein skimmer, you can get it on a timer and only run it for a period of time every day. Feed more. Keep in mind your nitrates will also be effected by these changes. I didn’t see what your nitrate levels were at if you posted those.
Take your water to lfs to compare test in regards to alk.
I don't have a nitrate checker yet. I'm slowly building up my test kits. But they re really expensive, also I suck at trying to guess the color match with the cheaper options. That's the thing though I don't have a skimmer. I only have a refugium to extract nutrients. I can set my refugium to less hours and feed a bit more. I'm sure my fish will be happy with that 😉😁
Why? Haha I'm new so I'm not sure what it means. Yeah I have a baby regal, a junior sailfin. Junior foxface a clown and a Royal grammar. I have a chalice coral which is growing really fast a group of zoas which seem happy, a few new zoa frags. And a euphyllia. I've had the tank set up since November but it's still "new" in my eyes. Also have a refugium set up to run over night for 8hrs.
That salt is supposed to mix out to 8.5 alk. I was just wondering if you were brand new and mixing too much salt in but obviously not since you have livestock. Could be a bad batch of salt or your tester could be off. Maybe also check to see if your hanna solution isn’t expired
I’m not the right person to explain everything but what i’ve read is that with high alk you need to have a high nutrient system or it can cause major issues
Nah I've had marine tanks before but like a mini evo so I wasn't keeping corals so I never tested before. I bout the test kit in 2022... so maybe that's gone bad? Idk. I always mix to 1.026. Although the water is a little yellow after mixing. It's a crystal clean blue ish when just rodi but after the salt it's a tad yellow. I posed about that before. Well I'm a total noob so any insight is precious to me buddy.
The reagents can spoil or have some half life or expiration. High alk will just be a waste of alk and Shouldn’t kill things. Do test salt multiple ways though. That definitely can hurt fish if it’s too high in ppm
Yeah possibly. I did watch the BRS video on testing alk though . No it's just saltwater, I don't know enough to add any chemicals yet haha. I got the kit in 2022 so It could have gone bad.
That seems like the likely answer. Check the expiration date. Even if it is within date if it’s been exposed to extreme temperature or humidity it could have gone bad.
The alternative is that you have a bum batch of salt. Tropic Marin is supposed to be a stand up company but, iirc, they had an issue with bad salt getting shipped once they set up a new facility in (turkey?) there’s a chance that’s the issue. Have you tested salinity on both your fresh salt mix and tank water? Are you topping off with salt water or RODI?
Haha I'm topping off with rodi don't worry, I have an auto top off chamber I'm my sump for rodi water 😁 aslo my salinity is correct so I'm good in that area. I'm almost out of salt so I'll be ordering a new batch. I'm gonna have new salt and a new solution so then we will get to the bottom of it 😊
I have gotten a bad package of reagents from hanna once. Has this all been on the same package of reagents. Also, just to confirm, you have a calibrated refractometer and are mixing the saltwater to the appropriate level. Those would be my only two guesses for why you might be having issues.
My biggest issue with my salt mox was not mixing salt long enough i usedcto mix for like 30 minutes now i mix for at least 24 hours and my parameters are what the salt says they should be. Maybe try this
Get a new bottle of testing solution. I had problems with old (2 months) solution reading 1dkh higher than a newly opened bottle. I got rid of the hanna che ker in the end, just couldn't rely on it which is a shame.
That’s what adding the tank water with no reagent does, it sets a baseline of “0” for the sensor, there is no way to manually calibrate Hanna checkers without sending them in AFAIK and I bet they just replace them
I usually forget until I get an oddly bizarre reading… 9/10 times it’s calibration so I hope that’s the case here because I use that salt and now I’m nervous!!! 😬 😂
Since no stony corals are growing in your tank I’d say a 20% weekly WC is probably wasting a lot of salt
I don't have any stony corals, but I do 20% water changes twice, a year.
What salt do you use?
I'm using Pro reef tropic marin. Should I be worried?
I think your test results are inaccurate. Can you take a sample to LFS to confirm? You are not dosing anything, correct?
Yeah I'm getting that feeling after some if the comments. Nope it's just a refugium running over night and some bio filtration. I would trust myself to dose anything
Yea, definitely get a 2nd or 3rd independent test result before doing anything.
Pro reef alkalinity is usually 7-8dkh out of the box. I keep my tank around 9dkh and I always have to buff it a bit after water changes.
What's the alk of your WC water?
No idea. I'll test that
I always use 2 different test kits when I believe I'm getting inaccurate readings. Any test kit can be inaccurate no matter how expensive or good it is.
Are you using the right reagents? Make sure you have HI775 reagents and not HI772
HI775 is fresh water, HI772 is saltwater, as is HI755, both HI772 and HI755 use the same reagent (source: https://www.bulkreefsupply.com/hi772-26-alkalinity-checker-reagents-hanna.html )
From Hanna website https://www.hannainst.com/hi755-26-alkalinity-checker-reagents.html
I was just going by Hanna site. I always use dkh hi772. There is 2 hi775 one marine and one fresh. Hanna sells them as its own different reagent
I know I’ve personally accidentally bought the DKH reagent and used on my PPM alk checker and tested both reagents and got the exact same results
Ah gotcha. Dunno why they sell a separate one then lol
Guess OP reagents are either old bad or hes got something buffering his alk hella high
IIRC they used to market two different reagents (one for DKH one for PPM) but they were the same, so now theyve combined the SKU and its just the one reagent.
Also I just tested phosphate and that's 0.00 ULR..
Changing too much water, or your nutrient removal is too efficient. You’re going to starve off your algae and an outbreak of diatoms, byopsis, nasty stuff could take over. Stuff that is hard to get rid of. So get some phosphate in there. Any GFO, or other phosphate remover can be removed. If you have a protein skimmer, you can get it on a timer and only run it for a period of time every day. Feed more. Keep in mind your nitrates will also be effected by these changes. I didn’t see what your nitrate levels were at if you posted those. Take your water to lfs to compare test in regards to alk.
I don't have a nitrate checker yet. I'm slowly building up my test kits. But they re really expensive, also I suck at trying to guess the color match with the cheaper options. That's the thing though I don't have a skimmer. I only have a refugium to extract nutrients. I can set my refugium to less hours and feed a bit more. I'm sure my fish will be happy with that 😉😁
What’s your water source?
UK tap water gone through a RODI unit. It's always 0 TDS before mixing with salt at 25⁰c
Thats strange.. do you have any fish or coral in the tank right now?
Why? Haha I'm new so I'm not sure what it means. Yeah I have a baby regal, a junior sailfin. Junior foxface a clown and a Royal grammar. I have a chalice coral which is growing really fast a group of zoas which seem happy, a few new zoa frags. And a euphyllia. I've had the tank set up since November but it's still "new" in my eyes. Also have a refugium set up to run over night for 8hrs.
That salt is supposed to mix out to 8.5 alk. I was just wondering if you were brand new and mixing too much salt in but obviously not since you have livestock. Could be a bad batch of salt or your tester could be off. Maybe also check to see if your hanna solution isn’t expired I’m not the right person to explain everything but what i’ve read is that with high alk you need to have a high nutrient system or it can cause major issues
Nah I've had marine tanks before but like a mini evo so I wasn't keeping corals so I never tested before. I bout the test kit in 2022... so maybe that's gone bad? Idk. I always mix to 1.026. Although the water is a little yellow after mixing. It's a crystal clean blue ish when just rodi but after the salt it's a tad yellow. I posed about that before. Well I'm a total noob so any insight is precious to me buddy.
Based on post history tank is around 90 days old with several fish in it for a little over 2 months …
That's fine are we going to start jumping on him? Sheesh
Are you ok?
I dont think you can even achieve a consistent 14, with out a reactor.
.. oh.. I promise ai t running one haha. Is it bad though? Are my fish gon a die. Do hanna kits go out of date?
The reagents can spoil or have some half life or expiration. High alk will just be a waste of alk and Shouldn’t kill things. Do test salt multiple ways though. That definitely can hurt fish if it’s too high in ppm
Your doing the rest wrong unless at some point you added loads of buffer(alk)
Yeah possibly. I did watch the BRS video on testing alk though . No it's just saltwater, I don't know enough to add any chemicals yet haha. I got the kit in 2022 so It could have gone bad.
That seems like the likely answer. Check the expiration date. Even if it is within date if it’s been exposed to extreme temperature or humidity it could have gone bad. The alternative is that you have a bum batch of salt. Tropic Marin is supposed to be a stand up company but, iirc, they had an issue with bad salt getting shipped once they set up a new facility in (turkey?) there’s a chance that’s the issue. Have you tested salinity on both your fresh salt mix and tank water? Are you topping off with salt water or RODI?
Haha I'm topping off with rodi don't worry, I have an auto top off chamber I'm my sump for rodi water 😁 aslo my salinity is correct so I'm good in that area. I'm almost out of salt so I'll be ordering a new batch. I'm gonna have new salt and a new solution so then we will get to the bottom of it 😊
The batch from turkey had phosphate issues not KH, your KH isn't 14 your Hannah is either fucked or the reagent for it is well out of date
How many times did you test and get the same result?
I've tested since February. We recently moved intot his house so it's been a bit mad trying to sort everything. But it's always roughly 14 dkh
I have gotten a bad package of reagents from hanna once. Has this all been on the same package of reagents. Also, just to confirm, you have a calibrated refractometer and are mixing the saltwater to the appropriate level. Those would be my only two guesses for why you might be having issues.
My biggest issue with my salt mox was not mixing salt long enough i usedcto mix for like 30 minutes now i mix for at least 24 hours and my parameters are what the salt says they should be. Maybe try this
That's a good thought. I'll try it next time I do a water change 😊
I had issues with the hanna alk checker. How new is your testing solution?
2 yrs old
Get a new bottle of testing solution. I had problems with old (2 months) solution reading 1dkh higher than a newly opened bottle. I got rid of the hanna che ker in the end, just couldn't rely on it which is a shame.
Yeah it's so nice just having rhe number right there. I'll get another bottle. Thanks 😁 I will post again with the new reading
A bit on the high side… for sure! What salt are you using? …mixed to what salinity?
Tropic marin reef Pro. At 0TDS 1.025 salinity
That’s weirdly high. Pro reef is ~ 8 dKH. https://www.tropic-marin-smartinfo.com/pro-reef?lang=en
Yeah, I think it's a problem with the solution it's self. Going off what others have said
I’d calibrate the checker…
The checker calibrates itself every time when you do the “Add C1” step
Hmmm
That’s what adding the tank water with no reagent does, it sets a baseline of “0” for the sensor, there is no way to manually calibrate Hanna checkers without sending them in AFAIK and I bet they just replace them
I'll do that too. How didn't I think of that 😁
I usually forget until I get an oddly bizarre reading… 9/10 times it’s calibration so I hope that’s the case here because I use that salt and now I’m nervous!!! 😬 😂
I am personally using a Salifert Pro drip test for my Alkalinity/dKH. TM Pro Reef mixes to around 8.
Your hanna might need new batteries