What can cause alkalinity to rise?

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#1
I have not dose in more than a month but my alkalinity keep on rising.

Tank specs

54 gal. Display Mixed reef with just a few frags of sps now, 4 fish, Live rock, 1”-1 1/2” sand bed, led light, skimmer, controller, heater, 2 powrhead and return pump, i have a fuge with no sandbed. I use filter socks and have carbon in a bag.

Maintenance

I use to dose about 10ml 2 part before when I have about 25 frags. I would manually top of the water in the afternoon. I do 10% wc every other week. I feed fish mostly pellets. Nothing else gets added to the tank other than the pellets twice a day.


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joseserrano

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#4
Has to be something being added. Even if you are adding the trident waste into the tank, I believe that will raise Alk. Something is being overlooked.
 

five.five-six

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#5
Are you still adding 2 part?

I usually target 10DKH, 420 ca and 1500 MG. I wouldn’t worry about 9dkh
 
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#6
Has to be something being added. Even if you are adding the trident waste into the tank, I believe that will raise Alk. Something is being overlooked.
Im not sure what to tell you, there is nothing else being added.


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#8
Are you still adding 2 part?

I usually target 10DKH, 420 ca and 1500 MG. I wouldn’t worry about 9dkh
I stopped adding 2 part more than a month ago. I keep my alk around 8-8.2. If it would stay there I would not worry about it will keep rising i have to do multiple wc in week to keep the alk at that level, using neomarine salt supposed to have alk around 8 but the salt actually only 5.7 alk.


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#9
Only other option is your trident and kits are wrong.
i tested salifert too within 0.50 of trident and that is verified when I tested the calibration fluid. Plus when alk rise on teident the alk rise on salifert too.


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#11
I’m doing another water change but im using a difeernt bucket of neomarine salt. I guarantee you the alk will drop by a litle after the water change then will start to rise again after a day or two.


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#12
I’m doing another water change but im using a difeernt bucket of neomarine salt. I guarantee you the alk will drop by a litle after the water change then will start to rise again after a day or two.


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What salt are you using and if all your test were conducted at the same time period (ie. 5pm with lights on, an hour after lights off, etc). Have tested the salt mix before WX

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#13
What salt are you using and if all your test were conducted at the same time period (ie. 5pm with lights on, an hour after lights off, etc). Have tested the salt mix before WX

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I use BA neomarine, I have a trident and corfirmed with salifert test kit. All test are done in the afternoon (after work). The salt mix are tested before wc, the alkalinity is around 7.5-7.7, I also have a bad batch bucket of neomarine that tested at 5.7 alakalinity). The alkalinity have level down since the last water change, but I still dont know why alkalinity would spike up. Hopefully it stays this way.


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#14
I use BA neomarine, I have a trident and corfirmed with salifert test kit. All test are done in the afternoon (after work). The salt mix are tested before wc, the alkalinity is around 7.5-7.7, I also have a bad batch bucket of neomarine that tested at 5.7 alakalinity). The alkalinity have level down since the last water change, but I still dont know why alkalinity would spike up. Hopefully it stays this way.


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From what I can remember(its been awhilelI don't think alk can leach from anything its more of consumable elements. So its being added in some form. I would think the best way would be is note down everything from the time you do a WC with measured results to the time your alk elevated with measured result. then looking back to everything that was added to the system. Than maybe starting with one aspect of the questionable(s) and remove it from the equations. It's a little tedious or PiTA. The knowledge would be well worth it. GL

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#16
I've had nothing but problems with that salt. I'm done with it.
Are you just doing water changes to replenish your alk and ca?
I use to manually dose 10 ml of alk and calcium , I only have about 25 sps frags but because of rising alk I lost most of it so I am not dosing right now just water changes.

Yes that salt mix have a lot of issues, my first bucket have very high phosphate. I will start using tropic marin.


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#17
I use to manually dose 10 ml of alk and calcium , I only have about 25 sps frags but because of rising alk I lost most of it so I am not dosing right now just water changes.

Yes that salt mix have a lot of issues, my first bucket have very high phosphate. I will start using tropic marin.


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Are you sure it’s the salt that had high po4 and not your rodi ?


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#18
Are you sure it’s the salt that had high po4 and not your rodi ?


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Yes, at the time I only have salifert test kit, the salt mix was reading 0.5 and rodi is at 0. When I called BA and gave them the batch number they new and he even acknowledge it was from a bad batch of salt. He sent me 2 buckets for replacement, one bucket have 5.7 alk and the other 7.7 alk.

When I finally got a hanna po4 checker, when I first tested the rodi water it was 0.09 but I know at that time my sediment filter and carbon filter needed to be replace so I bought one of those aquafx chloramine blaster add on and replace the sediment filter, now p04 is 0.01.


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