Potassium Supplement Alternatives for Zeo

[Joel A]

there are a few good salts with natural K+ levels, some better suited for zeovit systems than others.

The good K+ salts that come to mind are:
-Reefers Best (expensive, KZ salt... but geared towards zeovit)
-Gettanked salt mixes (formula 2 is geared towards ULNS systems, good all around)
-D-D H2Ocean (good in K+, but a bit expensive, and high in alk for zeovit systems)
-Tropic Marin Pro (sometimes it's found to be a bit low in K+, but pretty good)
-Tunze reef salt (another good all around zeovit salt, but a bit harder to find and more expensive)
-Coralife (K+ is good, but calcium and alk are generally high for zeovit systems)
-Seachem reef salt (K+ is generally NSW or higher, but it also comes with high alk and CA)

Personally, i've been using Tropic Marin Pro, but i've actually heard K+ is a bit inconsistent with TMP, I may switch to D-D, or Tunze salt... but i'm worried as to how much the slightly elevated alk (~9) of D-D will affect the system.

 

[Liam]

there are a few good salts with natural K+ levels, some better suited for zeovit systems than others.

The good K+ salts that come to mind are:
-Reefers Best (expensive, KZ salt... but geared towards zeovit)
-Gettanked salt mixes (formula 2 is geared towards ULNS systems, good all around)
-D-D H2Ocean (good in K+, but a bit expensive, and high in alk for zeovit systems)
-Tropic Marin Pro (sometimes it's found to be a bit low in K+, but pretty good)
-Tunze reef salt (another good all around zeovit salt, but a bit harder to find and more expensive)
-Coralife (K+ is good, but calcium and alk are generally high for zeovit systems)
-Seachem reef salt (K+ is generally NSW or higher, but it also comes with high alk and CA)

Personally, i've been using Tropic Marin Pro, but i've actually heard K+ is a bit inconsistent with TMP, I may switch to D-D, or Tunze salt... but i'm worried as to how much the slightly elevated alk (~9) of D-D will affect the system.

Just to add to your list

Reefers best salt is expensive and has all kinds of consistency issues.

D+D tests high in PO4

Coralife tests around 8.5 for alk,in a 5% water change as req by zeo this makes no difference to the recommended 7.5 dkh.
Coralife is around 500ppm calcium,not an issue in a 5% change.

 

[stevenp]

Just ordered a bunch of Potassium Chloride from iHerb. The more I read into ZEOvit the more I feel that it's a complete and utter rip off. Don't get me wrong - there's no question that it works, but the prices on the stuff are ridiculous.

 

[Joel A]

Just to add to your list

Reefers best salt is expensive and has all kinds of consistency issues.

D+D tests high in PO4

Coralife tests around 8.5 for alk,in a 5% water change as req by zeo this makes no difference to the recommended 7.5 dkh.
Coralife is around 500ppm calcium,not an issue in a 5% change.

coralifes alk is that low in your experience? I've never used it, but everything i've heard said it has more like 10 or 11 alk. If it's alk is truly that low, it might be a pretty good salt for the Zeovit sytem....

I agree reefersbest has had major consistency issues... they have supposedly ironed those kinks out... but who knows.

As for the D-D, where did you hear it has high high PO4? I've heard it's a really solid salt all around... the only reason i'm not using it as we speak is that alk is supposedly 9+ dKH.

 

[Joel A]

Just ordered a bunch of Potassium Chloride from iHerb. The more I read into ZEOvit the more I feel that it's a complete and utter rip off. Don't get me wrong - there's no question that it works, but the prices on the stuff are ridiculous.

I think some products are over priced... but at the same time it's hard to tell on some of them, because we don't know exactly what is in them...

FWIW though, the zeo products are all pretty heavily concentrated... they aren't watered down like a lot of other similar additives on the market, which is why they may carry a slightly elevated price tag.

My goal is to find a solid salt with K+ readings acceptable out of the box, and to replace tank potassium with weekly or biweekly water changes as opposed to dosing the new salt mix or dosing the tank with potassium iodide complex.

 

[Gardiner]

Just ordered a bunch of Potassium Chloride from iHerb. The more I read into ZEOvit the more I feel that it's a complete and utter rip off. Don't get me wrong - there's no question that it works, but the prices on the stuff are ridiculous.

I agree. The prices for Zeovit are crazy. Luckily companies like Fauna Marin, and Warner Marine are coming out with cheaper alternatives.

I just saw this morning that Warner Marine is coming out with a Coral Snow substitute that will be available next week.

 

[Joel A]

I agree. The prices for Zeovit are crazy. Luckily companies like Fauna Marin, and Warner Marine are coming out with cheaper alternatives.

I just saw this morning that Warner Marine is coming out with a Coral Snow substitute that will be available next week.

maybe we'll get lucky and heavy better priced competition will force zeovit to lower their prices... i think their products are the best on the market... but the price tag is pretty high like you guys are saying...

 

[Liam]

coralifes alk is that low in your experience? I've never used it, but everything i've heard said it has more like 10 or 11 alk. If it's alk is truly that low, it might be a pretty good salt for the Zeovit sytem....

I agree reefersbest has had major consistency issues... they have supposedly ironed those kinks out... but who knows.

As for the D-D, where did you hear it has high high PO4? I've heard it's a really solid salt all around... the only reason i'm not using it as we speak is that alk is supposedly 9+ dKH.

Yes i use and the test the coralife myself.

As for D+D look on there own website at the PO4 data for their salt.
The salt is harvested from the dead sea and at various times of the year can have high PO4. I also bought a small bucket to try and test.
The bucket i tested came in at 0.09 (hanna)

 

[snowmaker]

I just won a bag of Brightwell's NeoMarine Reef Salt. Listed on back, K+ is 398.8 ppm.
Even though I use I.O. - mainly because of price... and that it is working for me, I have more confidence in products that list quantities of the ingredients, but found out later that my confidence was false. Companies that do not list ingredients may say it is because it is "proprietary". I believe this is somewhat of a cop-out, and the real reason may be that it is because they do not actually manufacture it and have someone else do the manufacturing and have no control over the actual formulation. This was obvious to me when I spoke with one member who tested a well known trace mineral additive that turned out to be mostly water. The additive did list concentrations, but the actual values weren't even close - in fact when attempting to mix his own at the concentrations listed on the products' bottle, the contents precipitated out of solution and back into solids. He ended up having to make it in 2 parts to get appropriate concentrations. At least Potassium we can test for at home (I am not familiar with accuracy of this), but many other elements we cannot test for unless you happen to work at a place that has the capability, or the funds to have it tested for you.

 

[Joel A]

the jury is still out on the neomarine from brightwell... the listed parameters are great... in fact all but 2 of them are identical to 2 decimal points of NSW levels... go figure huh?

It seems brightwell may have just listed what ever parameters they wanted on the bucket...

as far as testing potassium, there are 2 test kits... both of which i haven't heard very good things about... but i am starting to hear better things about the KZ test kit now, so maybe they've started to iron out the issues with that test kit...

 

[UncleJT]

I've been thinking about gettanked's Formula 2 salt quite a bit. I've used IO religiously for 20 years but now that I'm experimenting with SLNS on this new system, I am very displeased with the low Ca. and high alk. High alk actually bothers me more. I started the new system with IO but may make the switch before I add corals.

 

[Joel A]

I've been thinking about gettanked's Formula 2 salt quite a bit. I've used IO religiously for 20 years but now that I'm experimenting with SLNS on this new system, I am very displeased with the low Ca. and high alk. High alk actually bothers me more. I started the new system with IO but may make the switch before I add corals.

if you do, be sure to review it . I too am seriously considering that salt... in the running with it are TMP, D-D, and tunze.

 

[UncleJT]

if you do, be sure to review it .

Only thing holding me back is the guys cocky attitude, failure to post prices online, and flat out refusal to communicate via email. He sells some supplies on eBay but makes it very hard to buy salt.

I emailed him once, stating my needs with exact quantities I wanted to order and asked for a price with shipping to my address. I get this insulting email back stating "I don't have time to type out emails, call me at ... to discuss your needs.".

Edit: just found some prices on his website.

 

[Joel A]

i had a very tough time finding prices as well... can you send me a link?

Glass cages is that way too... if you can't communicate via email now a days, your only hurting yourself...

 

[UncleJT]

i had a very tough time finding prices as well... can you send me a link?

http://www.gettankedaquariums.com/i.../Formula-2.With-Sodium.Chloride.Info.Page.htm

One thing of note, he only offers Forumla 2 in 25 gal. bags. Formula 1 is available in both 5 gal and 25 gal bags. 5 gal. is the amount of my water changes and a single use salt bag would have been perfect.

 

[Joel A]

well, you can probably just make up 25 gallons at a time anyways... it's not like it's a ton of water... just put a rubbermaid brute container near your RODI and use it to mix saltwater . Or if you're tight on space, you can use the 5 gallon slurry method.. (which i've confirmed does work)

 

[UncleJT]

Yeah yeah yeah, yadda yadda yadda. You are preaching to the choir now.

:.

 

[Joel A]

Yeah yeah yeah, yadda yadda yadda. You are preaching to the choir now.

:.

i agree though, 5 gallon packets would be cool... i wonder if it's hard to make 5 gallon packets consistent?

 

[UncleJT]

i wonder if it's hard to make 5 gallon packets consistent?

Well, he offers Formula 1 in 5 gal packets so it shouldn't be that inconsistent. He probably just has a lot less demand for Formula 2 than for Formula 1. I guess I need to emai... er, CALL him. Ugh.

 

[Joel A]

yeah, i agree that's annoying... lol.

I'm going to order some i think, we can try it together