Kalkwasser reactor caused snowstorm

[huskerduck]

I am out of town and left the poor wife with an unfair responsibility of dealing with my nightmare.

 

Before I left I got a chiller, Calcium reactor, and unfortunately a Kalk reactor so she wouldnt have to worry about my daily ritual of messing with the reef. Turns out the kalk reactor is obviously not set up right and actually stirs the kalk too much as its delivering it in the top off system, well last night after I left I get a deservable frantic call that something happened and the pump that delivers the RO water had created some sort of syphon effect and kept running, for about 1/2 hour. Tank clouded badly. I had her ( on the phone) shut the RO system down.

 

I asked her to imeadiately take tests starting with PH then Alk and the Alkalinty had dropped to 4 that fast(scary) but the PH appeared to hold at 8.3 ish, in a panic I told her to start by putting about 4 teaspoons of baking soda in the sump, this increased the alkalinity to about 7 and it had been at 11 earlier when I left. She put in 2 more teaspoons and it was back to 10 and held over night, PH held well too so maybe it appears stable as this is almost 10 hours later and holding.

 

Im sure everything is already dead but she says everything looks good but all live rock and plants are covered in "snow", she said it seems to be slightly clearing up and she emailed me these pictures.

 

 

 

 

She says the corals never appeared snowy because the lunar lighting was on and they were all vibrant even in the snowstorm, The fish were asleep but are all out and eating well and spunky, the snails appear to be cleaning trails everywhere ( bet thats tasty) and she says its appearing to clean itself but there is white Flakes floating around because I have pretty vigirous wave action with about 2500 GPH in a 125 gallon tank. She washed the large return sock filters last night almost imeadiatly because they were about due and seemed to collect alot of the Kalk ( thankfully) and replaced them to try and collect more flaking through the day and will re wash them in a couple hours.

 

Does she try and keep stirring and washing by blowing with current as to keep the percipitate floating or just let nature run its course? So much for helping her out, I fear the blenny, gobie and Stars, snails, shrimp arent liking their new diets

 

The strange thing is the calcium level plummeted down to 320ppm, Im guessing this was due to my panic remedy of slamming the alkalinity back up to 10 from 4, but I figured that low of alkalinity was certain death for everyone and the PH would climb to 12, I am wondering if she should turbo calcium back up to 400 while checking alkalinity throughout the next couple days, it may not even rise at all with all the precipitate, maybe a large water change? I hate to put her through that but........

[R2R2]

Have her bring in a water sample and don't do anything rash(like dump in a bunch of stuff) until we know what is up. Ryan (ps call me at home)

[impur]

Everything looks fine in the pics. You got lucky. Ryan is right, don't dump in a bunch of stuff.

 

Best thing for her to do is do a good sized WC, 25% or so should do everything some good.

[huskerduck]

Thanks guys, guess we'll wait and see. When I talk to the wife around noon I will relay info Ryan

[powdertang05]

ya your just fine the tank is perfect maybe alittle resdue but nothing more your just fine. when a kalkreactor is working correctly its a great product that maintains your ph and also balances you ALK AND CA so dont fill bad about buying the product i love my kalkreactor and recommend one to everyone i speak to.