Chemi Clean
Chemi Clean
What can I do to help clear an aquarium with fogginess caused by a calcium/alkalinity imbalance?
My 20 gallon tall reef-to-be (no corals, just live rock, clean-up crew and two true perculas so far) is very cloudy. Originally (I posted a question yesterday) I thought the calc was high and alk low, but I was testing incorrectly :/
After proper testing and retesting with another brand, here are my parameters:
Ammonia 0
Nitrite and Nitrate 0
Phosphates undetectable
PH 8.1
Calcium 440
Alkalinity 14dKH
The water is very foggy due to precipitation from the imbalance. I’ve got a HOB filter working right now with just empty filter floss, but it’s not really doing much.
Is there anything I can do or any product I can use that will help? I’ve heard of Chemi-pure Elite. Product description says it works for phosphates, silicates, and more.
Help much appreciated 
Assuming that the cloudiness is indeed caused by a calcium precipitate, it will settle out on its own or be removed by mechanical filtration within a few days.
Chemi-pure removes mainly dissolved (invisible) materials. It isn’t designed to remove calcium, because that would be highly undesirable in a reef tank.
If the filter floss you’re using doesn’t seem to be helping, try changing it for a smaller-pored physical filtration medium, such as “fine” filter foam, or a “polishing” filter cartridge (I’m not sure what they’re made of, but it looks like paper or polyester or something with similar fibers).