Randy's balling recipe

[hossam1984]

Hii all i bought those bags of 25k and i want to be sure if i can use them. Those are food grade. and how many grams from each one to mix in 5lt ro water?
Flakes 77% cacl2!!!
Abt. 47% mgcl2!!!!




And this is my 650 l reef with balling method

[hossam1984]

Help anyone please....

[dkeller_nc]

Randy's article on 2-part dosing with specific directions on how much to mix in what volume of RODI can be found here.

[hossam1984]

I know that but my problem is because the mgcl2 is 47% and the cacl2 is 77%. If that changes the recipe? And if it safe to use that products.
Those are anlayses of the products

[biom]

Yes, if you read Randy's article carefully you'll find that Randy says "...calcium chloride dihydrate (such as Dowflake 77-80% calcium chloride..." your calcium chloride is 77%.
Your magnesium is magnesium chloride hexahydrate, you'll need some Epsom salt to make Randy's magnesium part.
Food quality is OK.

[s2nhle]

Great. where did you get those?

[hossam1984]

Yes thats right about the cacl2 so i dont change and put 500g of my cacl2 and 594g of my nahco3 but what about mg is it the same? Because mine is 47%...
And i do have epsom salt with 99.5% mgso4*7h2o....
Still putting 3 cups of mgso4 and 5 cups of mgcl2??? This is my mdso4 analyse:


I bought them all in chemical store 110 dollar for all of them "4 bags of 25 killo"

[bertoni]

That magnesium produce is MagFlake or something very similar. It's made by the same company as MagFlake. It should be fine.

[hossam1984]

Thanks but what about my grams per littre because of the 47% of the mgcl2

[bertoni]

1560 ml (not grams) magnesium sulfate and 937 ml magnesium chloride should be right for the third part of the 2-part.

[hossam1984]

I think that's wrong because the article says: Dissolve Epsom salts (3 cups) and magnesium chloride hexahydrate sold by the Dead Sea Works company (5 cups) in enough purified freshwater to make 1 gallon total volume....
My problem is that my mglc2 is 47% if that change the recipe.
And how do i convert ml or cup to grams in mgcl2 and epsom salt?

[biom]

My problem is that my mglc2 is 47% if that change the recipe.

Your magnesium is 47% like in all magnesium chloride hexahydrate and it is the same like in Randy's recipe. You can easily convert cups in ml, there are plenty of online converters. Good luck!

[bertoni]

Right, the Mag Flake in Randy's recipes is 47% as well. It's the exact same product, actually, I'd bet, since it's from the same company.

[dkeller_nc]

Hossam - to be more explicit about what others are explaining on the thread:

If, for example, you have the compound MgCl2 (H20)6, you have 6 water molecules to every one molecule of magnesium chloride, and in the magnesium chloride molecule itself you have 2 molecules of chlorine to every one molecule of magnesium. The molecular weight of magnesium chloride hexahydrate (molecular formula MgCl2 (H20)6) is 203.3 grams per mole. The molecular weight of magnesium is 24.3.

So in the above compound, the mass percentage of magnesium is 24.3/203.3 (x100%) = 12%. So even if you have absolutely pure magnesium chloride hexahydrate, the "% Mg" is still 12%.

So getting a bag that says "77%" calcium on a bag of calcium chloride doesn't mean the material is 23% impurities, it just means that the calcium in the material makes up 77% of the total by weight.

All this said - you can simply use Randy's recipe without any adjustment. Even if your compounds are slightly different percentages of calcium, carbonate or magnesium by weight than what Randy assumed when writing the article, it will make no difference because the procedure you use is to start dosing the solutions at some low level, and adjusting the additions by testing the tank water and adding more or less of a particular one to maintain one's alkalinity, calcium and magnesium.

So if your solutions are a little more concentrated than Randy's, your dosing calibration through water test results will compensate for that. You just have to get the solutions somewhat close - within 20-30% of Randy's target will be more than good enough.

[hossam1984]

Okay thank you all. How can i converte from ml or cup to grams?

[dkeller_nc]

You don't really need to, just measure Randy's quantities out with a measuring cup. If you want to do it by weight (and have an accurate kitchen scale), I use 66g of CaCl2 dihydrate in one liter of RODI, and 78g of sodium bicarbonate per liter. That's not absolutely exactly balanced in Ca and Alk, but it's within the uncertainty of how much water the chemicals have in it (both CaCl2 and NaHCO3 will absorb water, so an exact solution isn't possible unless you go to extraordinary lengths to dry the chemicals).

[hossam1984]

Thats right but i am asking about mgcl2 not cacl2 and sodium. What is cup of mgcl3 in grams

[dkeller_nc]

I'd have to back-calculate Randy's concentrations (47,000 ppm Mg, 70,000 ppm sulfate and 86,000 ppm chloride) to arrive at grams of magnesium chloride hexahydrate and magnesium sulfate heptahydrate (Epsom salts).

Best plan is to simply use a measuring cup, since this solution is also to be dosed based on tank water test results (i.e., concentrations aren't critical).

[bertoni]

I would assume a density of 0.85 g/cm³ for the magnesium chloride, and about 1.05 g/cm³ for the magnesium sulfate, from this post:

http://www.reefcentral.com/forums/sh...5#post14556043