Salt Water Storage

[anygiven]

I’m mixing Red Sea Coral Pro water every Saturday morning for my water change and would like to mix more and store enough for the next week water change.  How long can I keep salt water stored for?

[jamo130788]

i believe red sea has approx 7 day storage life 

[Clown79]

Red sea coral pro has specific mixing instructions and can only be stored for 1 week.

[Sjadet]

1 hour ago, anygiven said:

I’m mixing Red Sea Coral Pro water every Saturday morning for my water change and would like to mix more and store enough for the next week water change.  How long can I keep salt water stored for?

Just store the fresh water and mix it up in a secondary bucket? In a sealed storage, cold and dark it lasts for years.

[Clown79]

Per red sea themselves, their salt is to be mixed no more than 4hrs and stored only for 7 days.

 

If you want to pre mix salt and keep it stored, salts like instant ocean or reef crystals can be stored for longer. 

 

Otherwise RSCP and Aquaforest both have 1 week limit on their salts.

[Nocturnal]

What's the concern with longer storage? Precipitation of minerals?

[Sailingeric]

I have wondered this too, wouldn't a quick stir make it good again? 

1 minute ago, Nocturnal said:

What's the concern with longer storage? Precipitation of minerals?

 

[Clown79]

Yes. Precipitation.

 

Certain salts aren't meant to be stored or overly mixed for that reason.

 

Instant ocean has no restrictions but needs to be mixed for 24hrs

[anygiven]

thanks for the info...much appreicated

[1891Bro]

7 hours ago, Clown79 said:

Yes. Precipitation.

 

Certain salts aren't meant to be stored or overly mixed for that reason.

 

Instant ocean has no restrictions but needs to be mixed for 24hrs

I never understood those directions. What I mean is, they say don’t mix more than x amount of time. Well, when I mix my salt I put it in a bucket with a pump for a bit and then change my water, pretty standard. Then I put it in a different container to continue to mix for another week (the water change) how is mixing it in a bucket different than putting it in the tank and continuing to further mix it for another seven days?

i really don’t mean any snark. I’ve always wondered this. 

 

 For the record once I got hammered and let a bucket mix for a few days and it got all nasty so there’s got to be a reason. 

 

Theres plenty that that do 2 week waterchanges. That’s basically mixing salt for two weeks. It works in the tank but not in the bucket. Wtf?

[MainelyReefer]

The heat from the pump and heater can cause things to precipitate out.  The way I see it the salt mix isn't 100% stable but those minerals that are prone to precipitation are probably readily available for coral uptake during that time period because they are overloaded in the water(my RSCP mixes alk @ 12+).  I never get precipitation on the tank heater or pump so I'm not sure why that happens differently than when I mix my saltwater Saturday and pull a stoner move and not change it until Wednesday as my WC pump and heater always get a white scale build up.  Also there aren't any bacterial colonies in our mixing buckets so assuming the wrong bacteria got in couldn't it be kind of gross?  I don't think stirring would reconstitute the precipitated minerals as they are usually very hard to dissolve again(I.E. you use vinegar to clean your mixing equipment which aides in its removal). It only takes 20 mins to dissolve RSCP and maybe 1-2 hour for a decent heater to heat up a 5 gallon bucket depending on starting temp so I have always tried to use the mix the day of as you get the best results.  Also I always hate using RODI to top up the mixing bucket over the course of a week and waste precious RODI which isn't cheap especially if its a recurring theme.  You want to only need 5g RODI to do your WC not 5.5g or more because we are lazy Reefers!  

[Clown79]

7 hours ago, 1891Bro said:

I never understood those directions. What I mean is, they say don’t mix more than x amount of time. Well, when I mix my salt I put it in a bucket with a pump for a bit and then change my water, pretty standard. Then I put it in a different container to continue to mix for another week (the water change) how is mixing it in a bucket different than putting it in the tank and continuing to further mix it for another seven days?

i really don’t mean any snark. I’ve always wondered this. 

 

 For the record once I got hammered and let a bucket mix for a few days and it got all nasty so there’s got to be a reason. 

 

Theres plenty that that do 2 week waterchanges. That’s basically mixing salt for two weeks. It works in the tank but not in the bucket. Wtf?

I really have no clue. Lol.

 

It made no sense to me. I understand the limitation on storage time yet the mixing instructions I don't.

 

I know a lot of ppl ended up with milky water when the rscp wasn't mixed per the instructions.

[SaltyBuddha]

I'm switching from Red Sea Coral Pro to the regular Red Sea Salt mix. The RSCP has the time limitation on the instructions but the regular mix does not...maybe it has to do with the elevated Alk and Ca in the RSCP. I'm not really finding any answers online either to what makes it precipitate in the bucket and not our tanks. 

 

[Sailingeric]

20 minutes ago, SaltyBuddha said:

I'm switching from Red Sea Coral Pro to the regular Red Sea Salt mix. The RSCP has the time limitation on the instructions but the regular mix does not...maybe it has to do with the elevated Alk and Ca in the RSCP. I'm not really finding any answers online either to what makes it precipitate in the bucket and not our tanks. 

 

 

[DSFIRSTSLTWATER]

Since I'm new at saltwater what i have been doing with the reef crystals is i make saltwater right after my water change. I mix it up till the salinity is spot on and then I let it sit for a week until I'm ready to do my water change. I throw a heater in it give it a little mix add the bubbler and once my temp is right i check salinity one more time and if it matches i do the water change. Been doing it exactly the same for almost two months with no issues. After seeing some comments I'm wondering if I'm doing anything wrong.

[Rob22]

On 4/23/2018 at 11:05 PM, 1891Bro said:

I never understood those directions. What I mean is, they say don’t mix more than x amount of time. Well, when I mix my salt I put it in a bucket with a pump for a bit and then change my water, pretty standard. Then I put it in a different container to continue to mix for another week (the water change) how is mixing it in a bucket different than putting it in the tank and continuing to further mix it for another seven days?

i really don’t mean any snark. I’ve always wondered this. 

 

 For the record once I got hammered and let a bucket mix for a few days and it got all nasty so there’s got to be a reason. 

 

Theres plenty that that do 2 week waterchanges. That’s basically mixing salt for two weeks. It works in the tank but not in the bucket. Wtf?

If you’re doing a water change the extra minerals will disperse out into the rest of the tank water which diluted them to levels that won’t precipitate. If you are starting from scratch, I’m not sure why it doesn’t precipitate out. Maybe the rock and sand help buffer it? 

[1891Bro]

On 4/24/2018 at 3:45 AM, GraniteReefer said:

The heat from the pump and heater can cause things to precipitate out.  The way I see it the salt mix isn't 100% stable but those minerals that are prone to precipitation are probably readily available for coral uptake during that time period because they are overloaded in the water(my RSCP mixes alk @ 12+).  I never get precipitation on the tank heater or pump so I'm not sure why that happens differently than when I mix my saltwater Saturday and pull a stoner move and not change it until Wednesday as my WC pump and heater always get a white scale build up.  Also there aren't any bacterial colonies in our mixing buckets so assuming the wrong bacteria got in couldn't it be kind of gross?  I don't think stirring would reconstitute the precipitated minerals as they are usually very hard to dissolve again(I.E. you use vinegar to clean your mixing equipment which aides in its removal). It only takes 20 mins to dissolve RSCP and maybe 1-2 hour for a decent heater to heat up a 5 gallon bucket depending on starting temp so I have always tried to use the mix the day of as you get the best results.  Also I always hate using RODI to top up the mixing bucket over the course of a week and waste precious RODI which isn't cheap especially if its a recurring theme.  You want to only need 5g RODI to do your WC not 5.5g or more because we are lazy Reefers!  

 

On 4/24/2018 at 4:42 AM, Clown79 said:

I really have no clue. Lol.

 

It made no sense to me. I understand the limitation on storage time yet the mixing instructions I don't.

 

I know a lot of ppl ended up with milky water when the rscp wasn't mixed per the instructions.

 

2 hours ago, Rob22 said:

If you’re doing a water change the extra minerals will disperse out into the rest of the tank water which diluted them to levels that won’t precipitate. If you are starting from scratch, I’m not sure why it doesn’t precipitate out. Maybe the rock and sand help buffer it? 

Who the hell really knows? All just speculation. I think the aliens do it too. I actually use Fritz rpm but it funks if you mix too long too. Not chalky precip bit weird goo. Had to scrub the bucket out.