Randy reccomends the Prestone Driveway Heat as one of the acceptable alternative to the Dowflake. The only reason that I could find in the article as to why he uses Dowflake as the "standard" ingrediant, is because it has a known concentration of calcium cholride. As such, you need to alter the receipe by 20% and and watch your calcium level a little more closely untill you are sure that you have the calcium portion "Balanced" properly. I quote :
"If you use an anhydrous or monohydrate calcium chloride (such as Dow Mini-Pellets, Kent's Turbo Calcium, Prestone Driveway Heat or Peladow Calcium Chloride), then you should use about 20% (1/5) less solid calcium chloride by volume to make the recipe. ... Peladow, Dow mini-Pellets, Prestone Driveway Heat, Kent Turbo Calcium and other dehydrated calcium chloride products are more potent than Dowflake. The dehydration makes them both more potent by weight, and more dense, so they are much more potent by volume. The problem is that it is rarely clear how much moisture they contain." Randy Holmes Farley,
An Improved Do-it-Yourself Two-Part Calcium and Alkalinity Supplement System Reef Keeping, Febuary 2006.
Regal,
Sorry to hear that your's mixed up brown. You stated that you got your Pellets a few months ago. Since a few months ago, was during the summer, and the product is used during the winter, they where probably laying around in a warehouse someplace and may have picked up this residue there. (or maybey not), Either way, I mixed up the Prestone, and it mixed up clear.
I am always weary of these "almost the same" substances. I personally would imagine/ hope that the chemicals we buy specifically for our tanks are processed with more care than driveway de-icers. I'm sure it's not far off but if I were to start cutting corners with my tank and something happened to my livestock I'd be kicking myself for a long time. I'd be more concerned with what's in the bag and not on the ingredients. Just my 2 cents.
I agree with you completely. The only reason that I am willing to put this stuff in my tank is because
Randy Holmes Farley said it was ok, and he metions this partiuclars de-icer by Brand Name. I as well a a lot of other people trust him when it comes to matters of tank chemistry. He has a pHD in chemistry from Harvard and is vice president of chemistry research at Genzyme. Here is a
bio.
You also need to remeber that this stuff is not made for the purpose of being a driveway de-icer, it is simply made, purchased and repackged with an apporpriate mark up on it depending upon the label.
The only reason I say it is almost the same is because Turbo Calcium is a anhydrous calcium chloride while Prestone is monohydrate calcium chloride. A chemical is "anhydrous" when it contains no water, it is "monohydrate" when it contains one molecule of water.