Help!! Advice? Alk and calcium problems

Set up 125 on oct 1 2017. Tank was cycled and added fish oct 29. Got impatient and added my softies and lps from previous smaller tank 2 weeks later. I was just adding kalkwasser to my ato and wasn’t testing for calcium or alk because the few corals I had all looked good. Went to fall fest and bought some sps and lps frags with some zoas as well. Also bought a jeboa dosing pump and some 2 part from brs. I added frags and tested. Alkalinity was 7.5 and calcium 450 so I started dosing like 50ml of alk and 20ml of calcium. Alkalinity was staying around same numbers but calcium was dropping daily so started chasing numbers. Long story short I ended up having to dose 300ml each every day for last almost 3 weeks. This was the only way to keep my alk at 8.5 and calcium 435. But I felt like was dosing way too much for how little coral I had. Another reason I started chasing numbers was because the sps and the new lps were starting to look bad just a week into having them. All sps have bleached completely and one lps (meteor shower) is all but bleached as well. I did find out my potassium is low so with the help of @beckerj3 i am fixing that and also am stopping my dosing of 2 part and going back to kalkwasser in ato. And plan on just doing about 30 gallon water changes once a week to see if I can get more stable numbers. I am curious if 300 ml of each is a crazy high number for a tank with not a lot of coral. All softies and a couple lps still doing good but lost all sps and a couple different lps. Obviously I messed up and was wondering if stopping dosing and and just doing water changes to try and get everything normal again is the way to go and wondering where is all that calcium and alkalinity going daily if I don’t have anything in there that would be soaking up that much to dose that much.

 

Also should clarify I didn’t just start dosing 300 ml off the bat. I was testing daily and numbers kept falling so I kept a upping 2 part until I hit consistently the 8.5 dkh and 435 calcium. I have been dosing the 300 ml each for last 4 days and numbers have been consistent. Also nitrates at 5 consistent phosphate at .05 salinity 1.025 temp at 77.9 ammonia and nitrite 0

 

I have not done a water change yet and last water change was the day before fall fest. Making water now and going to test the new mix before adding. But I will only make 12 gallons like you said instead of the 30 I was planning.

 

@xroads i used both Red Sea and Hannah checker for calcium and they had almost identical numbers and I got the calibration checker fluid for my Hannah alk checker so I thought maybe it was bad test or me but what are the odds of the Red Sea kit and Hannah checker having same numbers and both be bad also got the calibration fluid for the Hannah calcium checker and it was good. And I’ve been testing daily for almost a month and pretty sure I’m doing testing correctly. But I have been trying to read on this precipitation but haven’t really been able to figure out what that means or how to fix it or know if that is what’s happening. I have a little residue on heaters but nothing else. Is there a dumbed down version to understanding precipitation cuz I’m getting a headache from reading so much about it but not really getting/understanding it fully.

 

@beckerj3 will do

 

@xroads thanks for that explanation. That was kinda my plan now thanks to @beckerj3 but figured might as well post on here to see what anyone would say. But yes I’m just going to do small water changes and stop the 2 part and see how it goes with the coral I have left.

 

@xMermaidxx I haven’t been doing water changes but was planning on doing them to try and fix problem. But I do think my magnesium test kit is bad and need to go buy a new one. I am going to do a mag test on this new batch of water to see if I still get bad results from test kit and if so I’ll get new test kit. @xroads thanks I will give everything a vinegar bath.

 

@xMermaidxx thanks. I will for sure. I’ve been suspect of mag test for awhile but just have never went to get new one so if it ends up being even part of the problem then I will be mad at myself.

 

@blackx-runner jeboa dp4 doser
Calcium 30ml @ 10x a day
6pm-8:30pm-12:00am-2:30am-5:00am-7:30am-10:00am-12:30pm-3:00pm-5:30pm
Alkalinity 30ml @10x a day
6:30pm-9:00pm-11:30pm-2:00am-4:30am-7:00am-9:30am-12:00pm-2:30pm-5:00pm
Ph was 7.98-8.03 through out day and night.
Brs 2 part
But I don’t start off that much I just kept increasing it until my calcium and alk stayed at a constant number when testing but when I test mag it always read high like 1590-1600 but old tank read same with different salt but never had problems so don’t change mag test kit but now looking back obviously I should have. Also didn’t test new batches of water for changes either which obviously I should have before adding to tank but will now and will get a new mag test kit to see if my old one is indeed bad.

 

Goal 8.5-9 dkh
Was getting 8.4-8.8
Goal 440 calcium
Was getting 409-437
But I felt like it wasn’t right that I was dosing so much with such little coral stock but my first test before I started dosing I felt like my alk was low so I started dosing more of that than calcium and just fell down slippery slope. I kept just trying to research on what was going wrong instead of just actually asking someone for advice. I had my 20 gallon up for 2 years without issue but also only used kalk in ato and only had soft coral and a few lps so when I upgraded tank and bought all this new equipment I thought I was ready for harder corals and was thinking with dosing I could get away with less water changes. Water changes on the 20 was easy but was trying to get away with less maintenance on the bigger tank but seems like I was moving faster than my tank was growing and learned a good lesson. First test before dosing 7.5 dkh and 450 for calcium