Sodium Bicarb

[Wilky]

Just a note about the Bicarb, unless you're using warm RO you won't be able to dissolve 100g per litre and some will drop out of solution. To save waste I ended up using 85g per litre, which fully dissolves and made no difference to the amount of solution I dosed.

Currently experiencing the same problem, i'm going to leave it somewhere warm and shake up again tomorrow.

[Norvern Rob]

Just a note about the Bicarb, unless you're using warm RO you won't be able to dissolve 100g per litre and some will drop out of solution. To save waste I ended up using 85g per litre, which fully dissolves and made no difference to the amount of solution I dosed.

Currently experiencing the same problem, i'm going to leave it somewhere warm and shake up again tomorrow.

It will just keep falling back out of solution when the water cools again. It doesn't matter as such, but you may as well use less bicarb per L and have the same strength solution.

[Chew]

Magnesium attaches to the surface of calcium carbonate which is what rock and sand is. Until its covered the fresh surfaces of new sand and rock you useage will be alot higher than it will be when its settled down.

As for the sodium bicarb....you can always add 50g per litre and dose twice as much solution as the calculator calculates.

[Wilky]

number 2:

I sorted my solutions and set up my doser last night to a starting dose for each based on the calculator results intending to monitor it over a couple of weeks and adjust accordingly.

Came home today to a cloudy tank

I suspect that the doser has dosed the solutions at the same time and the calcium has precipitated out of solution as all three solutions end up in the sump within a cm of each other, so three questions:

1. Is the above correct or am i talking rubbish?
2. How do i clear the water - will this happen naturally?
3. Is there a way to tell the GHL to dose the solutions at opposite ends of the schedule - it only asks for quantity, flow rate and number of doses per day?

I think the balling will be a doddle once set up and running correctly, its just the fine tuning at the start that seems to be causing trouble

Thanks!

[The Heathen]

Wish I could help Wilky but havn`t a clue how to set these up


i would be using salted water and measuring what was dosed before using the additives though

[Midland-marine]

Chew is the one for this
PM him in case he doesn't see the thread right away
I suspect they it could be a case of starting them off at different times of day if you follow my meaning, then they should continue out of sync with each other
The GHL must take the start time as it's base and just goes the timed period and then does a dosing cycle so starting them at 8hr intervals should mean that they stay that way irespective of the daily amount of cycles.

Might me talking out my arse here but thats how i see it could work but chew will sort it out i am sure

Regards

[Wilky]

Thanks for the replies lads.

i know what you are saying Malc but you just tell the GHL you've plugged in a doser and tell it how much you want to dose per day - it doesn't work as a timer like others - there could well be a hidden menu on there for staggering the doses.

This is a screenshot:

GHL SS1.jpg

I'm not unduly worried - all livestock is happy as larry, and its not horrendously cloudy - just looks crap I've tested KH and Cal and they haven't budged so i know its not gone haywire and dumped loads in.

[Midland-marine]

Hi there

Yeah there must be

Chewy is yer man then

[Miggsy]

Chew is darn sarf in that there smoke .. he'll be online later with the answer

[Norvern Rob]

Pah, all this new technology. Miggsy's coke bottles would never have done that, and they doubled up as skimmer pipework

Could you not just cancel one channel and start one off, then 30 mins later start the other one off?

[Wilky]

Pah, all this new technology. Miggsy's coke bottles would never have done that, and they doubled up as skimmer pipework

Could you not just cancel one channel and start one off, then 30 mins later start the other one off?

Starting to agree Rob, but i am using coke bottles

I don't think you can use the GHL like that Rob, you basically set up the doser (and anything else like circulation and lighting) as shown on the screenshot and then upload it to the GHL - you can't start each pump individually - they don't run as timers, you just tell it what vloume of fluid you want to dose per day and in how many events (if that makes sense?) - the GHL does the rest. I'm sure there must be a function to set at what time the doses happen though, i'll ask on the GHL forum.

[Chew]

Just walked in the door....14 hour day and I'm shagged....and not in the good way!

Does sound like its precipitated straight out fella. It will settle in its own time. If its very fine the corals will actually catch it too and can utilise very fine particles so it not going to upset them at all. If you want it cleared faster stick a filter sock in.

Testing will normally not show dissolved calcium but total calcium. So they will include the precipitated calcium too because the test chemicals break the calcium carbonate down. KH tests are the same.

As for the dosing schedule.....I've not actually used a GHL doser so can't really be sure as to the answer so I just sent an email to Matthias who is the GHL developer to confirm how I think it works. Basically I think the GHL will never dose 2 pumps at the same time so if I'm right its not that. You are dosing quite a few ml of KH solution at a time though.....so lobbing 30ml in at a time would be my guess as to the problem. You are doing that twice a day so I'd change it to dose 5ml 12 times a day so its dosing every 2 hours. You can do the same for you calcium so do 5ml twice a day. the other thing is to be sure that the doses are entering the sump in a place with fast or turbulent flow so it mixes in before it can precipitate.

I'll let you know what Matthias says tomorrow.

[Wilky]

Chew, thats great.

I'll change the settings to as you say and will be much more stable that way anyway, and see how it goes.

It does dose into the return pump chamber directly over the pump so this should be ok?

Tomorrow is water change day and i've got a batch circulating now so this should help, i've got a filter sock in there too.

I've asked a question about how they dose over on the GHL forum too.

Thanks mate.

[Chew]

Should be OK fella. I'd see how it goes with those changes. The smallers dose the GHL can do is 1 second so you could go nuts and spread it out into even more doses but its over kill in my opinion.

Matthias and his gang are pretty good at responding on the GHL site so you should get an answer there but being late it might be tomorrow.