kalk dosing options

the toms aqualifter clogs with kalk, its not the actual pump that clogs but the line out of the pump. been there and have gone the route your trying. you will have to upgrade your dosing pump. or go with a cheap pump with a faster flow and larger lines

yes thats where i ended up ordering threw. but they are out of stock. placed the order just waiting for the item to come in than they will ship it out. i have to say they are awesome when you call. Enrico is a hoot! and very informative.

 

Well the lines clog when the Kalk hits the air, so if the lines are in the bucket and the output line is actually in the water I think it should be ok and clog less. However I am having one issue and Im sure its an easy fix. When the pump stops pumping the water keeps flowing through because a siphon was made. Does that mean I just need to have the bucket lower then where its getting pumped to?

 

First, the pump still actually feeds a little too fast for kalk IMO. So, you will want to get an ro quick connect valve from Lowes or HD. This will allow you to reduce the flow to a drip. This is best for dosing IMO, and will prevent any siphon from forming. Also, this can be useful because if a clog does form, you can increase the flow to force it out. I keep my bucket next to the sump at the same level.

 

Also, I should mention, personally, I prefer to let it drip, not have the line submerged. The reason is it only takes a localized pH of about 8.6 to cause precipitation. Since kalk is around 12.5, this happens easily. A drip allows the kalk to react with the CO2 in the air and lowers the pH a bit. This seems to reduce precipitation a bit and makes the kalk more effective IMO. Also, I'd rather clean the tube more often than my pumps.

 

i dont agree the aqualifter dosing pump only pumps 3 1/2 gph which is very slow. its problem is the clogging. i had my higher that the sump and ato kalk water. so even putting the out line into the water the pump would empty the out tubing and cause kalk sentiment build up in the out tubing.
also if you check the recommendations of the kalk stirrers they recommend a dosing pump that runs at 8 gph. so the aqualifter at 3 1/2 is a much slower pump

 

Your having problems because 3.5gph is too fast for for this setup you want a drip. My kalk mixer has a valve to control flow. If I don't lower it to a drip, I also get a siphon with the aqualift. If you are using an aqualift, you need a drip. This prevents a siphon and is very important to keep the pH at a reasonable level. Your tank does not need to go to pH 8.6 to get precipitation. Only the section of the sump you are dosing into.

If you read the documentation for the aquamedic kalk stirrer, under "section 1 theory", it states "This clear solution is called „Kalkwasser“ or lime water. Because of its high pH of 12.4 a dripwise addition is required, to avoid a dangerous rise of the pH value in the aquarium."

The reason they recommend a higher pump, is you can reduce the flow with the in-line valve. it is the same concept. And you can alto get a siphon if not setup correctly.

I have run the aqualift setup for some time and never had issues. You want to dose kalk with a drip, not a stream. The kalk stirrer will have the same issue with siphoning if not set up correctly.

 

Here is a link to the documentation
http://www.aqua-medic.com/products/docs/Kalkwasser_Stirrer_1000.pdf

 

and also i read the manual on the aquamedic and i seen were it says to drip. but that is not meant for when its being used with a ato system such as the tunze or equivalent to that ato. that tops off at the smallest amount of water loss. so a drastic ph raise would not happen this case.

right now im using my ato water to dose kalk. i do not drip, it pumps into my sump,yes it hits air before water since the line is not in the sump water, its at a slow rate when ever the sump water drops in the least amount. my ph is a steady 8.2 i know this because i have a pin point ph monitor in my sump. so each time i open the cabinet i see what the ph is. so with a ATO thats very touchy, and dosing such small amounts, dripping is not necessary . just a very slow pump is.

oh.... i didnt have a problem with siphoning. my aqualifter was mounted higher than the water levels in the sump and the ato water. my problem was out line clogging. i even tried better tubing it still happened. i would have to remember to roll the tubing in my fingers every other day or so. that got old fast, so switched my pump to one with a larger tubing and my readings are fine still 8.2 i do see at night the ph drops a bit. i get a reading of 8.21 that at the end of the day i get 8.26 so this is a pretty steady reading in my book. before kalk i had large swings in ph

im hoping when i hook the aquamedic up i can get the same results in ph. i cant see why not, its just doing the mixing for me. i'll than go back to using the aqualifter as my pump since its slower and wont clog because its just feeding fresh water to the stirrer

 

With all due respect, lime-water is always used as water top off. It should not be used any other way. All stirrers, mixers, etc... are designed to be part of a water top-off system. You therefore cannot add any more than the amount of water that evaporates without throwing off you salinity.

If you use as the sole means of water top off, then you are adding the MOST kalk possible via the mixer and have the MOST chance of precipitation. Therefore, it is even more important to use a drip. It does not matter what the pH of your tank is. If you add too fast, the pH in the section of your sump you add the limewater to, can rise too high and some or even all of the limewater you added can just precipitate out. it only takes about pH 8.6 or so for this to start to happen.

This is very common and can happen with absolutely 0 change in overall tank pH. You may not notice it, but it is happening, the extent to which depends on a number of factors such as current pH, temperature, sump throughput, even equipment contained in the sump and the materials they are made out of.

If you really over do it, and raise your tanks pH over 8.6, you can actually precipitate more than what you added, as you will start a chain reaction of precipitation.

People crash their tanks and cause all sorts of headaches using limewater. It has more risk and to use properly has much more specific requirements than a simple additive, such as a 2-part solutions. If you really want to dose kalk, I strongly suggest you read up on

Limewater
What Your Grandmother Never Told You About Lime by Randy Holmes-Farley - Reefkeeping.com

Calcium and Akalinity
Calcium and Alkalinity by Randy Holmes-Farley - Reefkeeping.com

and

Precipitation
What is that Precipitate in My Reef Aquarium? by Randy Holmes-Farley - Reefkeeping.com

These are some suggestions for reading, there is plenty more out there. Many people have spent many hours figuring this stuff out. Lime-dosing is well understood, really no guessing or subjective interpretation required to understand what the effects can be.
As to localized pH, randy states in his precipitation artile

" If the limewater is not allowed to disperse rapidly enough, meaning that the pH does not drop fairly quickly, additional precipitates can form, especially calcium carbonate. Additionally, if the limewater drips onto surfaces in contact with seawater (such as the sides of a sump, Figure 4), bulk calcium carbonate can form on those surfaces. This precipitation takes place primarily because the limewater has pushed the CaCO3 supersaturation very high by converting much or all of the bicarbonate into carbonate. Since the precipitation of calcium carbonate can be slow to occur, rapid dispersal of the limewater doesn't lead to much or any precipitation of calcium carbonate. But if a region maintains high pH for long enough, calcium carbonate will precipitate. How long this process takes depends on the degree of supersaturation, but can be on the order of minutes to hours."

There is a lot to understand when dripping lime and I can't possibly summarize a fraction of it. Lukily others, such as Randy have already done much more. So, please read. If you don't want to lean about this stuff, then I strongly recommend a safer method of calcium/alkalinity supplementation such as a 2-part solution. If you don't understand what you are doing, you will almost certainly get better results.

 

and I just thought I'd add a few reasons to be careful with kalk.

Major tank crash, big time losses. - The Reef Tank

Tank Crash - Saltcity Reef Forums

Kalk overdose [Archive] - CVR Forums!

Help!! kalk overdose - Marine Aquariums of South Africa

Kalk Overdose!! - Reef Central Online Community


If you do overdose, the articles I provided will help you. As I've pointed out before...


lime overdose!!!!!!!!!!!???? - Reef Central Online Community