# Help Salinity up to 1.032!!



## NVES (Apr 21, 2010)

Hello all,

So I noticed all of my corals receding today so I first off checked the salinity and it's 1.032!!! I don't know how it got so high, all of my water changes are done at 1.026.

Help, what do I do??

Cheers,
Aaron


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## Steel_Wind (Oct 26, 2013)

The receding coral would suggest your reading are accurate. If you have confidence in them - fix it, fast.

Start removing five gallons at a time, replace with RO/DI, leave your pumps and powerheads on, swirl and test.

Lather, rinse, repeat as required.


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## Norman (Feb 13, 2011)

You need to top up your tanks with freshwater only otherwise your salt levels will continuously increase...


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## SKurj (Oct 26, 2011)

drop it over a few days, don't try and do it in one evening.


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## Nicole (Aug 2, 2013)

Do you top up evaporated water with freshwater? You should. Just remove a small amount of tank water and replace it with fresh water (no salt). Do that everyday until you get where you need to be. No big deal.


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## Kweli (Jun 2, 2010)

I dont know your tank size.. but you are going to want to remove water and add freshwater in until the tank is sitting at 1.026

Need to do it quick enough so that nothing dies, but not so fast as to cause everything to go into a shock.

If your water changes are all at the proper salinity then I can only assume you are using saltwater to top-off the evaporation? Please only use freshwater for top-off, as the salt in the tank remains there even when water evaporates


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## NVES (Apr 21, 2010)

Thanks for the help all.

Yep, was topping up the tank with salt water. Lesson learned! Unfortunately I lost a few corals, also found out that my damsels are sps pickers.

Now I'm doing top ups with freshwater and weekly water changes with saltwater.

Cheers,
Aaron


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## Steel_Wind (Oct 26, 2013)

Too bad you didn't lose the damsels


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## Kweli (Jun 2, 2010)

You never loose the pests during a battle


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## Letigrama (Jul 6, 2008)

i actually have to always top up with SW, not sure why but my salinity levels drop if I just top with FW.


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## deeznutz (Aug 21, 2013)

Letigrama said:


> i actually have to always top up with SW, not sure why but my salinity levels drop if I just top with FW.


I hope youre using a refractometer to check salinity.

You should never, ever have to top up with salt water.


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## Steel_Wind (Oct 26, 2013)

More likely that the mix of water when put in did not have a chance to stabilize and gave a (false) higher salinity reading than it really was. I know that's a mistake I was making. 

With Reef Crystals, I had to let that water mix with a powerhead for at least four hours before reading it and adjusting for final salinity. Otherwise, my readings were coming in as falsely high.

If you do not wait long enough after mixing for the salt to fully dissolve and stabilize, you think you are adding 1.26 SW, but you are really adding 1.22/23. So the tank "seems" low -- but that's because it was never actually 1.25/1.26 to being with. When you repeat the same process in the same amount of time taken to prepare the SW, you end up getting the same false readings. 

So it becomes a case of "Lather, rinse, repeat."


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## Kweli (Jun 2, 2010)

Leti, that shouldn't be the case. Do you have leaking water somewhere? Salt doesnt evaporate..... it stays behind and makes the water saltier


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