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Who is balling here?


grassi

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I run 8.2 to 8.4 with 4 teaspoonfuls of kalk in 5 gallons of top off water. I also dose 2 part. I have to dose the alk. half about 3:1 with calcium. Magnesium is dosed once a month or so. Been using the D&D salt but nothing really stands out about it in comparison to the other salts out there. JMO

 

Dennis

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I will be doing this, just got a GHL stand alone 4 head doser.

 

http://www.aqua-digital.com/index.php/ghl/ghl-dosers/

 

So what will you be running/dosing are you going to buy brand or the chemicals and mix. Could you list what you are going to dose, i'm good with my tank now but I might look into this when I get my "tank room" done this summer

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there are some differences between-

 

balling full (dr heinz balling created a full supplemented additive method)

balling light (a simpler and easier method minus a ton of other supplements)

std 2 part (like b-ionic or any part a and b system)

2 part advanced. (includes additional a balanced magnesium)

 

i tried 2 part, then balling light "fauna marin". i now use randys diy advanced 2 part which includes his balanced magnesium.http://reefkeeping.com/issues/2006-02/rhf/index.php

there have ben major heated discussions in r.c forums for yrs now, also zeovit forum nanoreef.nl. thru my own personal investigations ive learned all use the same basic foundation of calcium and sodium bicarbonate chemicals, albiet mixed to different strengths. all the balling methods seem to be, an overpriced excess elements alternative to a good balanced method. the reason i say this, is...... our salt mixes already have higher concentrations of these same elements (vs n.s.w.) that are now being additionally added in conjuntion with balling formulations. why exceed the elements found to be high in salt mixes already....i try to stay close to n.s.w. it works already you know.

 

i use the profilux 4 head stand alone with randys high ph diy and have had excellent results. over the yrs i used precision, koralith, and other high quality reactors. between all the constant adjusting and c02 tanks emptying never found my tank to be more stable than this year! 8.3 day 8.1 eve. alk 9 calc 480. every single day, except water change week then its high or a few days but always balances out nicely. this thing has been the best item ive purchased. not to mention c02 is unhealthy for reef animals and drives ph down. after learning what i now know and talking to many others, things are really starting to change in regards to calcium reactors.

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bubble magus has yet to release one that keeps memory after power outages. always out of stock but do pop up on ebay .http://www.nuocean.com/pumps

 

vertex has one on their web site but no picture. sup to be around 400.

 

an insider mentioned fauna is working on several models but will be pricey and released next yr.

 

several other mnf are currently building as well but no releases as of yet.

 

buckeyefieldsupply has the dow flake, mag flake, and calcium in the formula in super cheap bulk purchases for you...... along with other really cool items for reef application. highly recommended on r.c. from the high end sps guys!

 

also, i keep my mag around 1400 at all times and use my fourth head to dose bio fuel even though brightwell seems to be taking a lot of heat on other boards for inaccurately posting some supplement values? i have done tons of research into this and the chemicals used in balling and even the owner of fauna says on r.c. his chemicals are the same deicer and blah blah blah at buckeye! just additional supplements. what most americans fail to realize is that in europe fauna has an actual salt mix they sell for this balling system. it contains less salts and elements. hope some of this helps and you find it interesting/Users/benhogan/Pictures/iPhoto Library/Originals/2010/Roll 170/0828091904.jpg

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So basically the balling method is just dosing calcium/alk/mag and possibly other elements slowly via peristaltic pumps?

 

I'm experiencing low alk currently, I am starting to think i've got more uptake now due to larger corals than i can replace via kalk and weekly WCs. So for my cube i'm really going to look into this method. I can't use a CA reactor, the CO2 just drops my pH too far.

 

Any other links you guys can toss my way would be appreciated!! :D

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Cool Dan. Are you thinking to get the GHL Profilux controller as well in the future?

How is going in Maui? :-)

 

The stand alone unit comes with a cotroller to program the doser, as for the main controller I like neptune better.

Maui is great, little rain in the morning but good for the rest of the day. Hitting all the good snorkeling spots when my kids go for a nap.

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So basically the balling method is just dosing calcium/alk/mag and possibly other elements slowly via peristaltic pumps?

 

I'm experiencing low alk currently, I am starting to think i've got more uptake now due to larger corals than i can replace via kalk and weekly WCs. So for my cube i'm really going to look into this method. I can't use a CA reactor, the CO2 just drops my pH too far.

 

Any other links you guys can toss my way would be appreciated!! :D

 

Yes, less or more that. One of the most popular (so popular that it is listed in most of the online reef chemistry calculators) is the Randy's 2 part.

RANDY HOLMES-FARLEY, Ph.D. is a rc member and you can find a lot of info there. Also, this article, even if a little old: http://www.advancedaquarist.com/issues/april2004/chem.htm

 

There are also modified version of it. But, as you stated, it is basically dosing element in some ratio (most of the time with dosing pumps).

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Ok i'm getting up to speed here now. Balling is the name of the guy who came up with this method, it doesn't have anything to do with how or what you are dosing.

 

Next the Balling method involves dosing alk/calcium/mag but also has trace elements mixed with those.

 

I don't think the increased cost is worth buying the actual Balling salts. I'm going to look into acquiring the ingredients for Randy's 3 part and going that way.

 

I also might DIY the pumps :D

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Yes, it is from the german guy who introduced it.

We have the cheap option to do our mix (brs). As for the pumps we could look around for some medical peristaltic. There are a few interested and we could even do a mini-group buy :-)

I don't know which recipe I'm gonna use yet... I need more readings too. We could share the knowledge in the thread.

 

 

I've found this info which is cool. I mean, think what they had to come up with to keep sps!

 

 

As you know the German aquarists are the forefront of many reef aquarium technology advancements. Back in mid 1980s the German government banned the importation of LPS corals, angel fish and butterfly fish into Germany, alleging they don't reproduce in captivity or they die easily as some of the banning reasons. What was left for the German aquarists were the sps coral species. Hence the advancements of many known technologies today, started due to this challenge of keeping SPS alive.

 

In 1970s, Peter Wilken, of Germany experimented calcium hydroxide (lime water = Kalk) as reef tank calcium supplementation. Almost two decades later in 1994, simultaneously Ernst Pawlowsky of Germany introduced calcium part A (alkalinity) and calcium part B (calcium), Rolf Hebbinghaus of Germany introduced calcium reactor and Hans-Werner Balling introduced the Balling method, an elegant and easy-to-use procedure. Hans-Werner Balling published this method in the technical journal on aquaristics DATZ (Die Aquarien und Terrarien Zeitung): Balling, H.-W. (1994).

 

Back in the early 1990s, Julian Sprung from USA introduced the calcium two parts A and B into the US market for the first time. A few years later Randy Holmes-Farley made many publications on this, calling it “DIY Two-part Solution”. There are set back of these two parts calcium A and B because they focus in balancing concentration of alkalinity and calcium but discard the magnesium concentration and everything else, more than 70 trace elements known.

 

The rest of the article can be found here

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What is you minimum ph during the night and during the day?

I mean, I've seen stunning tanks running at 7.8.

When I was referring to ph problems I was more thinking about fast raising due to the acid kalk solution

 

Up until last night I was hitting lows at 7.65-Last night after adding the second chamber I only dropped to 7.84.

We will see how he day highs go-I never got more than 8.11.

here are the levels over a week in the display

 

APEX.jpg

 

 

 

 

This is an interesting idea-I understand its not new but "new" to me.

 

Maybe for the big systems that have huge demands-my tank is only 75 gallons and I think I have a large amount of SPS, although not any (mabye 2-3) are of any real size.

Still not ruling out out the idea of adding the Kalk reactor inline to my top off-

 

Anyway great thread-

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Brad, your chart looks good to me, especially if you are gonna set up a bigger second chamber.

 

I've seen the Balling either in small tanks (more often) and in large ones (less often, maybe for the running cost).

The nice side of the Balling with dosing pumps is that you can keep your values in the right place, you can add traces on a regular and scheduled basis, and you have less equipment to deal with.

It is 3 heavy duty pumps compared to 2 reactors, a few pumps, regulator, stirrer, co2 and so on.

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Brad i've got a similar setup to you, 75gal tank ~20gal sump. I currently use kalk in my topoff and do weekly WCs to keep levels up. I had used a CA reactor, but it drove my pH too low.

 

I think the balling method sounds pretty simple and easy. Plus if you use Randy's DIY recipe, you can make gallons and gallons of the solutions for very cheap. For example you only need 2.5 cups of dowflake in 1 gallon of water for the CA solution. And the dowflake comes in 50lbs bags!!!

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Miles, similar setup here and as well weekly water change. All is growing and looking great. But it can always be better, and less painful as maintenance.

I also think that for our tank's dimensions this seems to be the perfect way to go.

Now I'm torn: waiting the bubble magus to be available or buy the pumps and control them with the controller...

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Yah the bubble magus looks really nice, and its ready to go.

 

Here is the link where the guy DIY'd drew's doser. He states total cost for 2 dosers was $150, so it'd be about $225 for 3. I'll have to check tonight, but i donno if i have 3 open spots on my DC8.

 

 

http://reefcentral.com/forums/showthread.php?t=1773806&highlight=diy+drew+doser

 

attachment.php?attachmentid=96754&d=1263255140

 

 

 

 

Does the bubble magus doser give you flexibility on how much it will dose? ie a variable range say 1ml-200ml per hour or something? If you can adjust that, then the bubble magus is the way to go. Much more flexibility and ease of adjusting.

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The bubble magus is a variable speed unit so you can control each dosing pump and set them for different rates. Thats slick!!!

 

 

Danik - does the GHL stand alone 4 head doser you got allow you to set different flow rates for each doser? I think it would be nice to have that 4th dosing pump.

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With the bubble magus you can add up to an insane number of pumps (I think 11 or so..).

And they also sell some matching solution containers and the acrylic tubing holder.

I'm sure the quality is not as good as the GHL. I'm running a Bubble Magus skimmer: it is not a Bubble King, but it works more than well

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Brad i've got a similar setup to you, 75gal tank ~20gal sump. I currently use kalk in my topoff and do weekly WCs to keep levels up. I had used a CA reactor, but it drove my pH too low.

 

I think the balling method sounds pretty simple and easy. Plus if you use Randy's DIY recipe, you can make gallons and gallons of the solutions for very cheap. For example you only need 2.5 cups of dowflake in 1 gallon of water for the CA solution. And the dowflake comes in 50lbs bags!!!

 

What's the low levels you saw? I looked at nearly everyone's history for their controllers here to see what others tanks are like;

http://www.reeftronics.net/

 

and swings like I have are not rare-as you know.

I am sure you have read as much, maybe more, on how stability is key as to targeting certain levels-and do not "chase PH" Granted I realize you want the levels within "range" of NSW but not at the trouble of dosing everyday only to have the tank "settle" in at the same level it always is at-like my PH, I can dose it up to 8.3 and it will settle back in to its same 'ol 8.13ish

 

I'll say in less than 24 hours I can see a big change in my PH from adding the second chamber to my CaRx. The chamber I built was only the 2" (inside diameter) pvc and 22 inches tall so there is not a lot of surface area-I just sent Charles a PM and he is building me a real chamber, not like my little proto type-but for the 7.00 dollars I spent on it-it was worth it-Its plumbed, I can run any media in it I want-if I choose.

 

Curious as to the PH levels you had-

 

With my CaRx I have always been rock solid on my params if I would just leave my tank alone and quite "adding" equipment.

Tested water AGAIN today

Ca 440

KH 10.8 (I like it a little high, anywhere between 10.2-10.8)

Mg 1400

 

Maybe as all the SPS take off things will be different???

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My pH went from a low of about 7.9 before the RX to a low of about 7.5-7.4. I buffered it weekly to keep it from going even lower, then gave up and took it offline. There wasn't a large swing but the high never even got to 8. I don't think i saw much negative reactions in the corals, but i think it would just keep getting lower and lower and then i'd be in trouble.

 

Yah when the SPS get larger you will see a noticeable difference in the uptake. I'm seeing that now too, as my current regimen has been fine keeping params rock steady for 2+ years. But i'm starting to see alk being consumed at a faster rate.

 

 

Alex thats good news. I just might have to go this route and pick one up. I saw the matching containers those would make the whole setup look real nice.

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So you pulled the CaRx ofline and are just using the Kalk as a top off-HMMM

 

I tried a different approach using the KalkRx with my CaRx,

My Ca hit 500, My KH went to over 13, plus it was adding a little more water than was evaporating-Basically I had the Kalk reactor dosing during the lights out period (Metal Halides) if the PH hit a certain pre-programmed value.

 

Just not sure what I am going to end up with, but I like the positive change I have seen in 24 hours with the second chamber-

 

Good to know though

Thanks!

 

(backtotopic)

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Brad, why don't you run the kalk as auto top off? That way you don't risk to overflow.

You can set the Apex to stir with OSC and put an if (ph>x then OFF).

 

Miles, let me know before you order one. I'm probably gonna follow you. I kinda know Chris, the guy from Nuocean and maybe we can have a little discount.

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