ArgaMight

[LINK]

I Just tested some DI water that was ArgaMight'ed. My calcium test didn't even register. Is this stuff that bad? I have the Red Sea Calcium Mini Lab Test, and it never made it to the start color. I didn't even come close. I then tested straight DI water to make sure the calcium wasn't so high that it was off the charts, and it tested the same way, never got to the starting point. This tells me that the calcium in the Argamight'ed water is so low that it isn't registering

Please someone tell me that this product isn't that bad, and that I didn't get completly taken.

 

[DKKA]

I don't have a CA test kit in front of me, but I wonder if they are designed to work on freshwater? I doubt it.

FWIW, I use the ARAGAMILK (same stuff, just premixed) on my softy tank and get decent (but not great) corraline growth. But I just pour it right in, I don't bother using it in my makeup water. I don't know what the CA level is on this tank as I haven't checked it in over a year, but I have to scrape the front glass regularly to remove corraline.
Tropicorium pushes Aragamight pretty heavily (at least the last time I was there) and they suggest mixing it daily with ro/di water and dumping it right in while it's still cloudy. I think this is different than what most people do with the stuff.
Dan

 

[liquid]

Claw, you got taken. I got the stuff just to test it and I got the exact same results with my Salifert Calcium Test. Heh, you can always use it in your sandbed as a really fine component.

Yeah, Tropicorium pushes the product but also realize that they also do weekly waterchanges of about 10% to 20% on all their tanks up there. Which do you think is doing more -- the AragaMIGHT or the waterchanges...?

Shane (aka 'liquid')

 

[Mouse]

I never thought Aragamight or Aragamilk were supposed to boost Calcium levels, i thought they were there to make sure that the alkalinity of your makeup water was on par. Otherwise every time you do a water change you would create a defecit that ultimately the arragonite in the sand bed would correct. But this would of course mean fluctuation in the alkalinity levels, hence adding arragamight to your make up water. It has the same uses as something like Re-mineral M not kalkwasser.

 

[Anonymous]

hi.
From the way they market them, "flash mineralization," etc., it does sounds like it will increase calcium in the water. But as anybody know, calcium carbonate is almost insolvable in regular water, so it is nothing but a milky suspension, if you shake it really well, that is.
For $10 a pound, you are paying mostly for the packaging. It is a small expense for a lesson.

 

[randy holmes-farley]

Calcium carbonate does have some solubility in fresh water, and that is the basis for this product. Forget a test kit, this is easily verified by dropping a pH electrode into a suspension of CaCO3 in water: the pH is above 9 (should be 9.96 if no extra CO2 enters the system and you were using calcite, 8.32 if it is fully aerated with CO2 in air and you were using calcite) because of the CO3-- (read alkalinity) that dissolves.

When this system (calcite in water) is in equilibrium with air, the alkalinity is about 1 meq/L.

That compares to about 41 meq/L for limewater.

Aragonite is more soluble than calcite, so you can pick up another factor of 1.5 or so. Consequently, the best you can expect from this system is a solution that is about 25X less potent than limewater.

Aragamight's claim to fame is the small particle size that speeds up dissolution. It doesn't get more to dissolve than aragonite sand, but it gets there faster because dissolution is surface area limited.

[ October 30, 2001: Message edited by: Randy Holmes-Farley ]

[ October 30, 2001: Message edited by: Randy Holmes-Farley ]

[ October 30, 2001: Message edited by: Randy Holmes-Farley ]</p>

 

[danmhippo]

aragamite is simply aragnite grounded to powder. Aragnite are commonly used in a CA reactor. In the reactor, the aragnite is slowly dissoved in low ph water. In your tank, unless your seawater Ph is less than 7, no matter how much aragamite you add, its not going to dissolve and you do not get the benefit of dissolved aragnite. Its more like dumping more aragnite gravels to your gravel bed.