Water Hardness and Top Up

PingG25 · 05/19/2019, 02:04 AM

I've been battling water hardness for the last couple of weeks. This. Morning the penny dropped. Top Up water! It has a reading that on top up the hardness drops and us now at 7. Is it ok to dose the top up water to a set level. May be an obvious question

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bertoni · 05/19/2019, 04:22 PM

I am not sure which definition of by water hardness you're using. For saltwater tanks, alkalinity is the most useful measurement. It's common for tanks to drop 1-3 dKH per day, if that's what you're measuring. Adding a supplement, either by hand or by top-off, is a reasonable approach. Are you dosing calcium into the system? If the tank is consuming a lot of alkalinity, it might need calcium dosing, as well. The usual consumption rate is 20 ppm per 2.8 dKH.

05/19/2019, 02:04 AM	#1
PingG25 Registered Member Join Date: Dec 2014 Location: Rugby Posts: 92	Water Hardness and Top Up I've been battling water hardness for the last couple of weeks. This. Morning the penny dropped. Top Up water! It has a reading that on top up the hardness drops and us now at 7. Is it ok to dose the top up water to a set level. May be an obvious question Sent from my iPad using Tapatalk

05/19/2019, 04:22 PM	#2
bertoni RC Mod Join Date: Mar 2002 Location: Mountain View, CA, USA Posts: 88,616	I am not sure which definition of by water hardness you're using. For saltwater tanks, alkalinity is the most useful measurement. It's common for tanks to drop 1-3 dKH per day, if that's what you're measuring. Adding a supplement, either by hand or by top-off, is a reasonable approach. Are you dosing calcium into the system? If the tank is consuming a lot of alkalinity, it might need calcium dosing, as well. The usual consumption rate is 20 ppm per 2.8 dKH. __________________ Jonathan Bertoni