NIGHTCRAWLER

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how do i get dKH down without affecting the PH. calcium hydroxide ?
my calcium is 540ppm, ph 8.3, phoshate.05, nitrate 0, salinity 1.023 dKH 12*
i have tried acid buffer, but that lowers the PH too.
 

aaron23

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do water changes or let your parameters slowly go down by themselves, meaning do not add more fuel to the fire
 

KathyC

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how did it get that high to start with?
dosing?
CA reactor?
kalk drip?

you have to eliminate the cause before you begin correcting it

Excellent post & question.
The best way to reduce your Ca (also too high)& Alk is through water changes. If you are dosing, stop.
The use of chemical additions to change your water parameters often results in a 'swing' with them elevating to where they were before and is only a temporary fix. Their use often is worse for the tank than slowing correcting the issue in the proper way.
As Frank said, you need to fix the cause of the problem.
 

NIGHTCRAWLER

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the tank has been like that since i set up. someone said that it was good too have high, but i think my calcium is locked up. i havn't added a calcuim suplment. i figure it will come down slowly. could it have been the salt mix, when tank was set up. i used oceanic.
 

NYPDFrogman

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the tank has been like that since i set up. someone said that it was good too have high, but i think my calcium is locked up. i havn't added a calcuim suplment. i figure it will come down slowly. could it have been the salt mix, when tank was set up. i used oceanic.

high alkalinity can burn SPS
high calcium above 480 will only precipitate in the water and usually will be found around heaters and pumps.
it was bad advice to tell you high is OK
what is your Mg??

finding and maintaining the correct balance is what separates good tanks and great tanks
 

Pedro Nuno Ferreira

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mag is at 1120 ppm

Hi
Then slowly increase it to 1300 ppm and try to keep it between 1250 and 1350 ppm by performing water changes, which will both help you to adjust KH, Ca and Mg.
From your readings you are in the zone 1 of calcium and alkalinty problems as explained in the article Galantra suggested you to read

Randy Holmes Farley said:
Calcium and Alkalinity Problems
If your tank falls outside of these ranges for either or both of these measurements, then how you need to go about correcting them does indeed depend on the relationship between the two. It is this aspect of calcium and alkalinity maintenance that causes problems for many aquarists.
figure1.gif
Figure 1. A graph showing possible values for calcium and alkalinity in marine aquaria. The red zone is the recommended target, and the blue dot represents values in natural seawater. Each numbered zone outside of the target area has a specific set of directions to get back to the target.
Figure 1 shows a graph of calcium and alkalinity for marine tanks. The red zone in the middle represents the desired range for both parameters. The blue dot represents the values present in natural seawater. We will use this figure to determine a course of action for each of the four numbered zones outside of the red target area. So the first step is to see where your tank falls on the graph, and then follow the directions given for that zone.
Corrections for Zone 1
Zone 1 is the easiest problem to correct. Unfortunately, it is also very uncommon. In this case, both calcium and alkalinity are on the high side of normal. Moreover, if you leave the tank alone, the problem will likely correct itself, and you will end up in the red target zone (though you may also pass through it into zone 2 if you wait too long).
figure2.gif
Figure 2. A graph showing how to correct values within zone 1 by allowing calcium carbonate to be deposited in the tank (the blue arrow).
What this zone implies is that both calcium and alkalinity are elevated, and that by removing calcium carbonate from the water, either through biotic deposition into coral skeletons or coralline algae, or through abiotic precipitation, as on heaters, the levels of each will drop in an appropriate ratio. More specifically, the tank parameters will move along a line parallel to the two lines bordering this zone, and directly into the red target zone (the blue arrow in Figure 2). If you are smack in the middle between these two lines, as in Figure 2, then you will continue to move in the middle of these two lines down into the target zone.

This movement can continue right out the bottom end of the target zone (into zone 2), of course, so once you reach the target zone, you�ll have to reinitiate normal calcium and alkalinity additions.


Again the best way as suggested already to correct this, is by water changes.

Concerning the Magnesium levels of 1120 you have, if you chose to do it by using a magnesium additive, which you should avoid as adding chemicals to the tank is always complicated, especially in the situation your water parameters are!!!, then do it over the course of 4 days at a rate of 50ppm a day or even longer until you reach 1300 ppm or 1320ppm (avoid keeping values at the lower or upper limit levels, so that you do not fall out of range should it go down or up),but again do it instead by means of water changes.

Magnesium is the third most abundant ion in sea water and plays a very important role in balancing Alkalinity and Calcium and among other will help prevent disastrous precipitations as a result of the unbalance between the Ca and KH

Randy Holmes Farley said:
Magnesium is an important ion for reef aquarists. In addition to its many biological functions, it serves to prevent the excessive precipitation of calcium carbonate from both seawater and aquarium water. Since both calcium and alkalinity are very important to organisms that we keep, making sure that they are not lost to excessive precipitation is an important part of aquarium husbandry.


Now the value you read of 1120 ppm is or can be interpreted as being a result of calcium carbonate precipitation caused by the unbalance between Ca and KH,

Randy Holmes Farley said:
Sinks for Magnesium in Marine Aquaria
The primary sink for magnesium in aquaria is coprecipitation with calcium carbonate. This occurs in organisms, as shown in Table 1, and also during the abiotic (non-biologically driven) precipitation of calcium carbonate (such as on heaters).


so by increasing the Mg to the correct levels and lowering the Ca and KH, this done through water changes, you will be both avoiding the risk of a tank crash in consequence of a "snowstorm" or "rain" caused by the sudden precipitacion of calcium carbonate and correct the levels of them all smoothely...so please do it through water changes, gradually, do not use any buffers or chemicals as you could end up in water parameter sudden swings.... Its simple, just perform gradual water changes

Randy Holmes Farley said:
Precipitation can begin when one of two things occurs:
Randy Holmes Farley said:
1. [FONT=&quot] [/FONT] Calcium carbonate seed crystals are added to the water. In reef tanks, the addition of fresh calcium carbonate sand will often suffice. This addition will initiate the precipitation of calcium carbonate (likely containing some magnesium and strontium as well). 2. The supersaturation is pushed to unusually high levels. This can be caused by a rise in pH, a rise in temperature (as on a heater; Figure 1), or more obviously, by a rise in either calcium or carbonate.
Figure1.jpg
Figure 4. An aquarium heater with a thin coating of calcium carbonate on the portions that get hot. This coating collected in a few months. After a year or two in the aquarium, this coating can become so thick that large chunks can be broken off.


Still from you explanation the cause for this is still unclear...you wrote that some one told you to keep values like that, but exactly what did you do eversince you started the tank?

About Calcium and Alkalinity read some more from Randy Holmes Farley

About Alkalinity read some more from Randy Holmes Farley

About Calcium read some more from Randy Holmes Farley

Cheers
Pedro Nuno;-)
 

NIGHTCRAWLER

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no, my tank has been like that since i set it up, all i used was oceanic salt, live sand, and live rock. no chemicals were ever added, until 2 weeks ago when i tryed lowering the dKH but found it was also lowering the PH. so i put buffer in to raise it back to 8.3 because the acid buffer had PH to low.the calcium and dKH have been locked since i started the tank. pet store said that it was good that its high better than low. but it hasn't moved. im thinking that the mag has them locked up, could that be. set up of tank was 11/14/08. now by doing water changes, that won't raise my mag since salt mixes don't have enough mag in them. so was thinking of raising mag slowly by using kent-m
 

KathyC

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Best to just let the numbers come down slowly on their own through water changes. Less shocking to the tanks inhabitants.
When you mix up your next batch of SW, it would be a good idea to measure the Ca, Alk & Mg before you add it to your tank to find out if you are adding to the problem with the salt mix being out of whack (small possibility).

What you don't want to do is use any sort of chemical as those PH swings can be very deadly to your fish!

Can you post the numbers of a newly made batch of SW? (when you do it again)
 

cybermeez

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I’ve been struggling some time with a very similar problem. It is almost assuredly because of my calcium reactor. The tank pH was too low so I added Marine Buffer to get it around 8.2 during the day. That in turn caused my Alk to skyrocket to 15 dkH and I've lost 3 rare acros and one powder blue milli to bleaching (on the flip side I'm learning which corals in my tank are bullet proof). I just got a new Reef Fanatic co2 regulator (my experience with Milwaukee has been awful - the thing was impossible to get dialed in) and I'm getting ready to set up a second stage on the calcium reactor. I use Seachem salt and am aware of the issue regarding its high borate content on Alk testing so I got the Seachem reef status test kit. I am also going to pull the pH probe out of the sump water and hook it up to the calcium reactor (just got the lid for the Korallin that will permit that). Anything else I should know or be doing so I don't kill any more corals?
 

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