Redsea part 4 vs All for Reef
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Naturalreef
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I have switched from all for reef to Red Sea 4 part using Reefdose 4 for about a month. So far I love it. Initially had to start with a low dose so my tank could settle in. Since then, have been using the calcium test once a week to dose and so far so good.
Been a huge advocate of heavily automated reef tank and I’m getting tired of all the maintenance and expenses required with automated testers. I’m now trying to go simplified with occasional Hanna testing.
Been a huge advocate of heavily automated reef tank and I’m getting tired of all the maintenance and expenses required with automated testers. I’m now trying to go simplified with occasional Hanna testing.
Anyone use the red sea complete reef care (4 part) and recommend it?
I had been using their Foundation A/B/C (plus the 4 part trace elements) that look like this (total 7 parts) But I see now that they have a new 4 part system that is dosed based off of calcium only. Anyone use this complete care system? Anyone like dosing just by Calcium uptake? Is that...
www.reef2reef.com
Theres a lengthy thread when it first came out. I have no experience with AFR or RS 4 part. 4 part does seem pretty pricy to me though.
Any reason your unhappy and looking to switch?
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Brianbo
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Anyone use the red sea complete reef care (4 part) and recommend it?
I had been using their Foundation A/B/C (plus the 4 part trace elements) that look like this (total 7 parts) But I see now that they have a new 4 part system that is dosed based off of calcium only. Anyone use this complete care system? Anyone like dosing just by Calcium uptake? Is that...
Theres a lengthy thread when it first came out. I have no experience with AFR or RS 4 part. 4 part does seem pretty pricy to me though.
Any reason your unhappy and looking
Have you noticed any change in your corals as of growth or coral, what about your parameters staying stable, I feel like when Im dosing afr my calcium and mag are droping and my alk is staying in rang and I'm constantly changing my dosage
Naturalreef
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It’s only been a month, but I notice more polyp extension and encrusting ,parameters are stable. It took a little time to dial in initially, but quickly came in line. I also like using the Red Sea app and having it adjust the dosing pumps for me after inputting a calcium reading.
My parameters with all for reef were out of whack even with large water changes to reset the balance. All I can say is so far so good and I like what I’m seeing.
Salty_Northerner
Valuable Member
What's the reason of thinking to change if you don't mind me asking?
AFR is actually a great product once dialed in. If things look good I'd just keep doing what your doing.
gbroadbridge
2500 Club Member
Only recently found out about it but it looks expensive compared to a basic 3 part + traces.
I use AFR for my Nano but wouldn't even think about using it in an SPS heavy large tank due to cost.
Call me cheap.
My opinion is that switching from AFR to a 4 part is just adding complexity and failure points where you already have a working simple single doser system.
I'd stay put.
Solo McReefer
Valuable Member
Why?
Salty_Northerner
Valuable Member
What do you use for your large tank? And I won't call ya cheap lol
DanyL
Valuable Member
The first difference would be trace elements.
Both their 4 part which have them included together with Alk, Ca and Mag, as well as their separate 4 bottle “Trace Colors” (which can also be used with DIY balling, like I do) contain 34 trace elements, compared to the 17 most other companies provide.
I’ve seen many tanks that use either AFR, or TM/FM traces and aren’t able to achieve proper colors (at least with SPS), constantly chasing deficiencies in their ICP results and not realizing that the underlaying problem stems from this very reason.
I too can have some deficiencies in my ICP tests from time to time, but they are rare and insignificant in comparison.
The other noticeable difference specifically relates to the nature of how AFR works.
Calcium Formate, the active ingredient in AFR, uses bacterial processing to make Alkalinity available in the system, and therefore have 2 side affects:
1. A delayed release of alkalinity.
2. It is essentially a carbon source, with all the implications, good or bad that come with it.
gbroadbridge
2500 Club Member
Sodium Carbonate for Alk (Wholesale 5kg food service bags)
Calcium Chloride for Ca (Wholesale 5kg food service bags)
Mag Chloride (Food grade - 5kg Food Grade)
Balling Salts - Aquaforest Mineral Salt (5kg buckets)
Trace Elements - Aquaforest Components Strong (1 litre)
Salty_Northerner
Valuable Member
I get what your saying. I've never had an issue using AFR in my system and understand how it works pretty well. When dosing I'd always have a 8.5dkh. the only downside I found was it takes a bit of time to dial in. Once you know the daily consumption rate it was always so predictable. My ICP testing is simply doing weekly water changes. The cost up here in Canada is a joke on how much to buy and send one off.
Atm I'm dosing Pharma kalk just because of the dang heat and CO2 pooling in the living room and battling low pH. I've had to stop my AFR and am adding aquaforest iodum at 1 drop a day and adding aquaforest life source. Corals look alot better now, coincidentally it may just be the 24/7 kalk dosing and keeping the pH up. I don't know but whatever is going on the system is happy. I do though can't let go of the trace elements AFR gives every day and thinking of possibly looking into a good trace additive. Any thoughts on what would be good to try? Apparently alot of aminos have traces in them but I use Acropower and I can't find any info if there is any in their product.
Salty_Northerner
Valuable Member
Hmm your a high roller lol! Hey tell me your thoughts on the aquaforest trace components? Is it a single product or multi pack of different bottles?
gbroadbridge
2500 Club Member
4 bottles of traces that are mixed into the 3 part solutions
Salty_Northerner
Valuable Member
Thanks for the reply, as I'm fairly new to aquaforest is there a single all in one trace that they possibly sell or is all their traces in multiple bottles?
What do you mean by and it adjusting the dosing pumps? Could you elaborate? i bough AFR but havent opened and I have a return to make to BRS anyway so now that I am reading this I think I will return the ALF! I did unwrap the plastic and couldnt even read the directions the print was so light!
I decided to go with that after watching a BRS comparison of prices to dose and was just about to buy dosing pumps so I sad the hell with the dosing pumps!
I do use more alk then calcium so one of my worries with afr. Is it the same with you?
I do have new corals coming in so thinking probably not a good time to make the change though. Is it that difficult to dial in that you think I should wait! Its a huge order that I am kind of being jerked around about and they owe me big time so I can make them wait a while as well!
Appreciate any advice. I have never heard of this before until now!
Salty_Northerner
Valuable Member
From my understanding you dose the 4 bottles using their app and they dose where to when the main bottle is empty then the rest will also be empty. You dose for the week and test the calcium and from there you'd enter that into the app and it's supposed to do the correct dosing from there.
That would be a hard pass for me. AFR is a proven product in my eyes and a simple one at that. I've been doing AFR for 11 months and have never been concerned about calcium. Sure I've had it around 450-460 but really never worried about it. It always kept the dkh at my preferred 8.5 level but the only down side was there isn't a pH boost or pH stabilizer in the product. Summer time we keep everything closed up to keep cool so I stopped AFR for now and just dose kalk 24/7.
DanyL
Valuable Member
I do weekly water changes on both of my systems too, but it isn’t a replacement for a periodic ICP test. Trace element consumption varies between systems, and the more coral you have - the faster it would deplete.
That’s one of the drawbacks of AFR acting like a carbon source, which would slightly lower your PH.
Most of other additives would either be PH natural like Sodium Bicarbonate, or will raise it like Sodium Carbonate/Hydroxide.
You’ll not only need to dose trace elements when using kalk, but also Magnesium as well.
I can only recommend what I have good experience with, and it’s Red Sea Trace colors.
Some do, and some don’t.
I don’t know about Acropower ingredients because they aren’t public - but even if they do have some traces, it’ll not contain all the necessary elements just because many of them would react to each other.
There are also many trace elements found in food, you can look at the ingredients to see which ones.
Yep the more I am reading the less interested I am! I think a hard pass for me as well!
I am looking into changing some things. I dont have a fuge because of little space! Do you run a fuge?
I also have low ph plus my nitrates are up to 25_ 28 and I have 3 tanks. I have heard that a fuge gives you a ph boost so I was looking into a hob one since my tanks are all 46 g and below. I am not sure if its worth the expense to add 3 of them and the light though. I guess if I dont get the boost I want then have to figure out a another way thats space saving! It sounds promising though killing 2 birds with one stone and also quiting gfo!
I know kalk ups ph to but kind of scary to me! I dont have an apex or any high tech gear at all to tell me if I have overdosed and to scared of wiping out my tank! What do you use for that? I think I read a ph probe is another way!
Afr sounded to good to be true! My concern is that I use more alk then calcium though! I want to make the change now too but with these corals coming in and lots of them I guess the timing isnt right! Ill just hang on to the bottle because I sure like the idea of dosing one thing! Especially since I have been hand dosing forever!
Salty_Northerner
Valuable Member
No fuge nor do I want the extra hassle and expense of having one. Sure they suck up CO2 but they also suck up other elements.
Yes I was afraid of kalk as well but not now. I use BRS Pharma kalk as it's so clean. I have the lightest dusting on the bottom of my 5000ml holding tank and use an ecotec versa dose pump. It's simple to use and is very accurate. I'm still dialing it in and ATM dosing 790ml in a 24hr period. Just a nice slow drip and pH has improved alot. I was tired of my Apex alerting me at 3am because the pH was dipping below 7.8 and even with the windows open a few hrs a day when it's cool out the pH wouldn't rise much at all. On a good day the tank would hit 8.10 but that was in the spring time. I drip to evaporation and am about 90% there figuring out the evap for the day. I set my Wi-Fi Kasa smart power bar to turn off the ATO at night and rely on the kalk drip to keep a very close height in my return chamber. Sometimes a snail will cover one of the overflow grates and trigger the ATO but that only happens at night. Google Chris Meckley or better yet here watch this video as he really explains kalk.
You don't need to spend a fortune on a kalk solution. Here is my simple setup. It works and as for magnesium I don't have much of a problem nor do I need to supplement it very often. I'll test it weekly and it's in range. I know this got off topic but besidrthe trace elements I'll deal with that later down the road but since starting kalk it's been alot easier and cheaper and just works. Corals are loving the increase in pH so while I was a bit freaked out thinking I'd crash the tank it's been a treat using it. Also that video I linked don't concern yourself with his method as he uses the Neptune dose pump which you need to program through the apex.. the Ecotech versa and Mobius app is simple as input your daily dose in ml and that's it. Just let it run and spend about a week monitoring your dkh ( which you don't need to care about) Chris explains it very well. Just dose as much as evaporation lets you.
Sry for the ramble
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