Sorry I didn't get back to you right away, I was so sick yesterday I didn't get out of bed and I was so far behind at work I was there 13 hours today.
Filtered water would be a lot better than tap, but distilled would be better yet. Check out a lfs, they may offer RO/DI cheap, I only pay .30 per gallon. Also, what brand of salt mix do you use and what do you keep your specific gravity at? Different mixes have varying results in alk and calcium concentrations. You could have your fresh mixed salt water tested just to make sure it is in balance (which was just suggested)...
I just found this on another site, hope it helps.
"Here is a list of what I measured for the big three in a number of the salt mixes we use today. This is intended as a guideline and I, in no way, guarantee these figures. All I can say is they were all tested under the same conditions, with a number of different brand test kits, using the same methods for each test. I believe these numbers are reasonably what you can expect from these salts mixed at 35 ppt or SG 1.0264 @ 25 C."
Salt Brand Calcium Alkalinity Magnesium
Aquatic Gardens 430 8 1240
Brightwell Neomarine 370 11 1140
CoraLife 560 9 1380
Crystal Sea Marinemix 340 9 1050
Crystal Sea Marinemix Bio-Assay 340 9 1050
D-D H2Ocean 450 10 1380
Instant Ocean (new) 400 11 1350
Kent 540 11 1200
Marine Environment 480 7.5 1450
Oceanic 580 8.5 1650
OceanPure 510 10 1320
Red Sea 400 8 1300
Red Sea Coral Pro 490 7 1300
Reef Crystals (new) 490 13 1440
Reefer's Best 420 11 1200
SeaChem Marine Salt 500 10 1400
SeaChem Reef Salt 540 10 1450
Tropic Marin 375 10 1230
Tropic Marin Pro Reef 450 8.5 1380
Tunze Reef Salt 420 9.5 1350
Thanks for the great info! On the tank then I was using Reef Crystals but I might start using just IO or something with less in it seeing that I don't really have much coral. I see Reef Crystals has an ALK of 13....is that high?
Originally Posted by BWsReef
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