Question regarding new tank cycling and calcium reactor

landlord · 07/25/2007, 08:53 AM

Greetings,

This should be quick. I am setting up a 75 gallon tank. It will be cycling for some time with 150 lbs liverock, supposedly cured. At any rate this time around the tank will have a calcium reactor in use. Is there any advantage or disadvantage to cycling it with the reactor running, without it running, or does it even matter.

If it matters the tank will be running a DelTec Turbo 1250 skimmer, a pair of Tunze NanoStream 6055's, a filter with carbon, and one running phosban. There will be some water changes during the cycle process as well.

Thank you in advance for your time, assistance, and knowledge.

Kurt

LobsterOfJustice · 07/25/2007, 09:35 AM

It would be better not to run the reactor. Your tank at this point is not consuming any calcium or alkalinity, so there is no point. You would just have to re-adjust it anyway once you added corals and your demand became higher.

Frick-n-Frags · 07/25/2007, 10:00 AM

to extend what LoJ said, if you were to be proper about this and do all tweaks based on your water param testing, you would find that you quickly have alk/Ca too high when running the reactor and you would have to dial it waaay down to keep your parameters in line, should you decide to use it.

in thinking a little further, I can't really find fault with running the reactor with the bubble count really low. the alk will drop wrt time regardless and it probably could be monitored and tweaked to keep the alk rock solid from day one.

Frick-n-Frags · 07/25/2007, 10:09 AM

tip number#2

mix 1.13grams of baking soda into exactly one gallon of RO water.
upon successful completion of that excercise, you are now the proud owner of a gallon of gen-U-wine 10dKH calibration solution

you will now test this with your alk test kit and see what the test kit says. you will repeat the test twice more for consistency and see how close the average is to 10.

if it measured 9 for example, you know your kit is "one dKH low" so next time you measure a 9 in your tank, you know it is really 10
this "correction factor" makes any fairly repeatable test kit quite accurate.

Aquarist007 · 07/25/2007, 11:38 AM

Quote:

Originally posted by Frick-n-Frags
tip number#2

mix 1.13grams of baking soda into exactly one gallon of RO water.
upon successful completion of that excercise, you are now the proud owner of a gallon of gen-U-wine 10dKH calibration solution

you will now test this with your alk test kit and see what the test kit says. you will repeat the test twice more for consistency and see how close the average is to 10.

if it measured 9 for example, you know your kit is "one dKH low" so next time you measure a 9 in your tank, you know it is really 10
this "correction factor" makes any fairly repeatable test kit quite accurate.

neat----do you have a similar test for checking out a pinpoint pH meter? (assuming you can't get a hold of the solutions)

07/25/2007, 08:53 AM	#1
landlord Registered Member Join Date: Oct 2003 Location: Alexandria, KY Posts: 1,937	Question regarding new tank cycling and calcium reactor Greetings, This should be quick. I am setting up a 75 gallon tank. It will be cycling for some time with 150 lbs liverock, supposedly cured. At any rate this time around the tank will have a calcium reactor in use. Is there any advantage or disadvantage to cycling it with the reactor running, without it running, or does it even matter. If it matters the tank will be running a DelTec Turbo 1250 skimmer, a pair of Tunze NanoStream 6055's, a filter with carbon, and one running phosban. There will be some water changes during the cycle process as well. Thank you in advance for your time, assistance, and knowledge. Kurt

07/25/2007, 10:00 AM	#3
Frick-n-Frags Registered Member Join Date: Oct 2000 Location: north central OH Posts: 10,740	to extend what LoJ said, if you were to be proper about this and do all tweaks based on your water param testing, you would find that you quickly have alk/Ca too high when running the reactor and you would have to dial it waaay down to keep your parameters in line, should you decide to use it. in thinking a little further, I can't really find fault with running the reactor with the bubble count really low. the alk will drop wrt time regardless and it probably could be monitored and tweaked to keep the alk rock solid from day one. __________________ Only Dead fish swim with the current. Current Tank Info: 2 50 gal tanks, sump, still BB

07/25/2007, 10:09 AM	#4
Frick-n-Frags Registered Member Join Date: Oct 2000 Location: north central OH Posts: 10,740	tip number#2 mix 1.13grams of baking soda into exactly one gallon of RO water. upon successful completion of that excercise, you are now the proud owner of a gallon of gen-U-wine 10dKH calibration solution you will now test this with your alk test kit and see what the test kit says. you will repeat the test twice more for consistency and see how close the average is to 10. if it measured 9 for example, you know your kit is "one dKH low" so next time you measure a 9 in your tank, you know it is really 10 this "correction factor" makes any fairly repeatable test kit quite accurate. __________________ Only Dead fish swim with the current. Current Tank Info: 2 50 gal tanks, sump, still BB

07/25/2007, 09:35 AM	#2
LobsterOfJustice Recovering Detritophobe Join Date: Jan 2004 Location: Cary, NC Posts: 7,443	It would be better not to run the reactor. Your tank at this point is not consuming any calcium or alkalinity, so there is no point. You would just have to re-adjust it anyway once you added corals and your demand became higher. __________________ If it's worth doing, it's worth doing right. I remember when zoanthids were called things like "green" and "orange" and not "reverse gorilla nipple." Current Tank Info: 180g reef with all the bells and whistles