Hello,

My tank is about 230g of water volume. I did a CA test the other day and it came out at 340. I would like to bring it up to 420-450 range. I am looking using Randy's 2 Part Solution. I have a COMPAT DualFlo pump that I was going to use.

Product Detail (COMPAT DualFlo ® Enteral Feeding Pump) - Novartis Medical Nutrition U.S. (http://www.novartisnutrition.com/us/productDetail?id=10)

I know at the beginning I will need to add a lot to bring my levels up. I would dose this over a few days while testing.

My question is this. From what I am reading is after I get the levels up I will need to only add like .2 - .3 ml to keep it up. How do you add this? Would I hang a 1000ml bag and add the CA to it and dose that?

Will it not just pull from a reservoir instead of a bag? I dose from 2 gallon jugs. When I started dosing 2-part, I found it easier to get my alk and cal where they should be using Seachem cal and alk, and then maintain those levels with the 2-part. I didn't use the calculator either. I just started dosing and adjusted to maintain the levels I wanted.

I will say, using 2 part has been GREAT for my tank. Since I started using it, my SPS and clams have really put on good growth, and my levels have been rock solid. Just don't forget to keep an eye on your mag, since 2 part doesn't replenish it.

I can joy rig it somehow to use a bottle. So your saying add the CA into a 2 gallon bottle?

I have 2 one hallon bottles. One gallon of alk, one gallon of calcium. they last me a couple of weeks each.

I do not think I am explaining right.

My dosing pump can not drip in .3ml of a solution. It does 1-295ml per hour. So when adding the CA to the tank do add the .3ml from the 1 gallon jug straight into the tank or add it to RO/DI water and drip it in over time.

Ah, OK, I follow you now. 0.3ml/day is a tiny amount, are you sure that's right? if it is, I don't see the point in even using the dosing pump at this point. I think I'd just manually dose with a syringe. If you go that route, dose them at different times of day. Calcium in the morning and alk at night, or vice versa.

The info is from Randy's 2 Part webpage

Table 1. Suggested starting daily doses of this supplement in different aquaria.

Tank Description: Suggested Starting Doses:

Recipe #1 Recipe #2

Fish-only with live rock 0.1 mL/gallon 0.2 mL/gallon
New tank, few corals 0.2 mL/gallon 0.4 mL/gallon
Low demand 0.3 mL/gallon 0.6 mL/gallon
Mixed tank 0.5 mL/gallon 1 mL/gallon
Heavy demand (SPS corals) 1 mL/gallon 2 mL/gallon


I was thinking about doing Recipe #1 at a Mixed Tank.

those numbers are PER GALLON of tank volume. so if you have a 10 gallon tank you want to dose 3.0ml.

Yep, that makes MUCH more sense :)

Ok... That makes a lot more sense now. I was thinking why would anyone ever need a dosing pump.

So my total volume of water is about 240g so I would do about 72ml per day.

Yep, so you could just set your pump to dose 3 ml/hr and just let it run.