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Why is there hesitancy in using vinegar with Kalk? (1 Viewer)

I'm not having any low alk issues and been using Kalk only for going on 4 weeks now. Don't forget when the bacteria metabolize the vinegar the result increases alk. So while looking at equations it may look like alk will fall, it doesn't.....

So you'd suggest adding more vinegar?
 
Kalkwasser is probably the #1 topic that gets asked about the most in the chemistry forum and I've never heard Randy mention that vinegar causes an inbalance to kalk.
 
Perhaps I should retest. I added some 2-part alk only to try and balance. I'll just keep monitoring it I guess.
 
Kalkwasser is probably the #1 topic that gets asked about the most in the chemistry forum and I've never heard Randy mention that vinegar causes an inbalance to kalk.

I'm not saying it necessarily does, I'm just trying to figure it all out. Also, just because Randy hasn't said so doesn't mean it doesn't. Maybe just being nitpicky, but I'd rather think of it as 'curious'
 
Could be precipitation....

I'd suspect precip if it both ca and alk were high, but on zibba's levels I don't see it.

I just noticed that you weren't adding more kalk when you started adding vinegar--do that. If you supersaturate it, it'll only drop out of suspension, causing no issues. Adding vinegar is def. going to allow for more kalk to go into the solution.
 
How much more kalk can be added?

If you want to calculate how much acetic acid is actually in there (about 5-7% of your white vinegar) and then use the formula weight of the calcium hydroxide to balance it, by all means duder! but I'd just say... some. obviously it's going to depend on how much vinegar you add, but you could pretty easily just drop in some extra.

as DG says that when the acetic is metabolized, you get alk back, I would imagine it just takes a while for the colony to build up.
 
How much more kalk can be added?

Off the top of my head at the maximum recommended 45mil of vinegar ( Capman was dosing far greater in his experiments ) will allow 3 teaspoons of Kalk to dissolve rather than just 2 teaspoons.
 
If you want to calculate how much acetic acid is actually in there (about 5-7% of your white vinegar) and then use the formula weight of the calcium hydroxide to balance it, by all means duder! but I'd just say... some. obviously it's going to depend on how much vinegar you add, but you could pretty easily just drop in some extra.

as DG says that when the acetic is metabolized, you get alk back, I would imagine it just takes a while for the colony to build up.


It's been too long since O. Chem...or any chem for that matter so I'll just go with the "some" and see what happens. As was stated before, it would be much easier to do with a conductivity meter, but I don't have one right now - nor do I plan on getting one anytime soon.
 
Off the top of my head at the maximum recommended 45mil of vinegar ( Capman was dosing far greater in his experiments ) will allow 3 teaspoons of Kalk to dissolve rather than just 2 teaspoons.

We're still talking per gallon here right? 45ml/gallon vinegar = 3 tsp/gallon kalk?
 
conductivity would change with the additional ionic content, so that wouldn't help if you're adding vinegar unless you do some calculations to figure out what your saturation is. It's not o.chem, and I may even play around and do a couple tomorrow, they're pretty basic stoichiometry. actually, if you HAD a conductivity meter, you could just dump a bunch of kalk in there, test the conductivity after it settles, then you know what your conductivity will be at saturation. then, the next time you make it up, add it in small bits until you hit that point.
 
if you HAD a conductivity meter, you could just dump a bunch of kalk in there, test the conductivity after it settles, then you know what your conductivity will be at saturation. then, the next time you make it up, add it in small bits until you hit that point.

That was my point and I think that's what DG did.
 
yeah, I guess that was a bit of a brain fart. good thing I have a test tomorrow morning... :mad_3:

speaking of which, I better get off to bed.
 
Update:

Added 5 gallons of RODI + 15 tsp of kalk + 100 mL of vinegar. I'll be testing this afternoon and tomorrow afternoon to see where I'm at.
 
do let us know...

chem test in 80 minutes... *crosses fingers for no more brain farts*
 
I'd suspect precip if it both ca and alk were high, but on zibba's levels I don't see it.

I just noticed that you weren't adding more kalk when you started adding vinegar--do that. If you supersaturate it, it'll only drop out of suspension, causing no issues. Adding vinegar is def. going to allow for more kalk to go into the solution.

It doesn't matter... you're still dosing something with a very high pH (>10), at NSW levels of ca and alk and a 'micro site' with a pH of 10, there is going to be some precipitation. Depending on how long this local pH stays high will determine the amount of precip....
 
It doesn't matter... you're still dosing something with a very high pH (>10), at NSW levels of ca and alk and a 'micro site' with a pH of 10, there is going to be some precipitation. Depending on how long this local pH stays high will determine the amount of precip....

I can't see why it would be greater than the non-vinegar precip levels of saturated kalk.
 
I've been using 15 tsp kalk + 150mL of vinegar in 5 gallons of RO/DI. With the increase in temperature outside, I've been evaporating more water and adding over 2 gallons of this solution per day and haven't had to dose 2-part daily. My pH is constantly around 8.4, lowest I've seen it in the past month has been 8.25, but during the day it will rise to 8.5ish. My AC Jr doesn't turn on the kalkwasser if the ph is > 8.5 so sometimes I have to manually add RO/DI. When that happens, I typically add some 2-part at the same time to make up for the cal/alk additions.

When doing some testing for how much vinegar to add, I went all the way up to 200 mL / 5 gallons, but this was too much and caused a bacterial bloom. 150 mL seems to be the max that I can go without getting a bloom. Hope this helps someone out.
 
Zibba, what is the sign of "bacterial bloom" to look for when adding vinegar to kalkwasser?
 

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