proper use of kalk?

Ok so ithis might sound stupid but ... I'm dosing 2 part atm and want to switch to kalk, I researched the forums and this is what info I got,

Dosing kalk.when mixing you have to wait at least 15 hours or until its not cloudy and the particles are to the floor.

I'm not sure about the next step, you have to find out how much gallons of evaporation your tank gets a day and figure out how much alk/ca/mg is used a daythen how many tspns your kalk products tells you to use ( 1/4 tspn per gallon or more depending on your ca/alk/mg is being used)

The next step I'm bummed. I have a ato, its like a float switch so whenever evaporation occurs the pump turns on to fill up with r/o water people say they drip it into their ato container, but wouldn't that cause kalk overdose since its pouring a lot of r/o water into the system?

Second question, you found out how many gallons of water is being evaporated and you use that to drip over night ( 1 drip every 4-5 seconds) is the kalk contsainer suppose to be used up in the morning? Or let it drip throughout the day?

I'm just curous if you runout in the morning then wouldn't your corals use up the ca/mg/alk? Or if you drip it over night and throughtout the day wouldn't you have more evaporation or is your ato bsuppose to handle that?

 

i have a 5 gallon bucket and thats my ATO bucket... you need to mix 1-2 teaspoons of kalk per gallon of water..

to keep my levels stable, i use 10 teaspoons of kalk, in a 5 gallon bucket of rodi water for my ATO, when my float switch turns on, the saturated lime water goes into my tank a little bit at a time, this is how most people do it, just using their ATO..

when you mix kalk, just use an old powerhead to mix it a couple times a day... mine has an old k1 in the bucket and it comes on 4x a day and is on for 1 minute to mix.. this keeps my limewater to it fullest saturation...

but kalk doesnt increase your levels, it just keeps them stable, so if your levels are low, then you need to use 2 part, or dose with whatever is needed, get them to the numbers you like, and then start using kalk water to keep it stable..

 

gotcha!

 

you mix the kalk in with your rodi top off water, 1-2 teaspoons per gallon...so since i have 5 gallons of ATO i use 10 teaspoons of kalk, then i turn my powerhead on for a minute, then let it sit, by the time my ATO will kick back on to top off, the kalk will have settled, also make sure your pump that is in your KALK RODI TOP OFF WATER BUCKET is at least 1.5" from the bottom, you just want to top off the middle clear layer of kalk water, the top will form a crust and the bottom with have the kalk slush that is used up..

 

yes, K1 is in my top off bucket, as well as another pump i use to pump my top off water,

so to break it down, i have a 5 gallon bucket, filled with rodi water, i add 10 teaspoons of kalk, i let a k1 mix it, then let it settle, and when my float switch turns on, saturated top off limewater will go into my sump... this way, kalk is added at a slow rate over a long period of time, this helps with overdosing with kalk and having it snowing in your tank...

so dose accordingly to get your levels where you want them, then use an ATO with saturated limewater to keep them there..

 

i got that part, but the part that confuses me is that if your ATO turns on and it drips 2 drips per second, wouldnt evaporation be faster? thus your saltinity gets higher or are you using 2 containers ? one for plain R/O water and the other is your mixers of Kalk and R/O

 

i think you have the ATO method and DRIP METHOD confused... you only use the 2 drip per second method when your dripping a gallon of saturated limewater just at night,

your ato should come on quite a few times throughout the day and should only be on for a short time, you want your float switch to be just on the edge of turning on and off...to keep the water level in your skimmer perfect and working efficiently...

when using kalk, your supposed to have a PH monitor, and each time you add it, you only want to add enough to increase your ph by .2


so if i were you, i would add 5 teaspoons of kalk to a 5 gallon bucket with a powerhead to stir it, and a your ATO pump going to your sump.... to start and see how just 1 teaspoon a gallon keeps your tank, if your levels dont stay level then i would up the kalk dose to 2 teaspoons a gallon...

so when your ATO turns on you slowly add kalk water to your system,, and not dripping however much you evaporated throughout the day in one night

also doing the drip method is such a pain, and the only people that really do this are people that dont have sumps with an ATO.. its way easier to just add the kalk to your bucket of rodi water used to top offs

 

Doh now I get it! So when pH rises above .2 my controller will shut off the ato? But how fast does pH drop? Another question, if my pH rises .2 how will I lower my saltinity if my ato is turned off? Or is it depends how much tspns I use with the kalk